Penn State women’s volleyball hosted the top teams in the country this past weekend at Rec Hall going undefeated in the Big Ten/Pac-12 Challenge.
Due to strong blocking, The Nittany Lions beat No.21 Colorado in just three sets with a 13.0-3.0 blocking margin on Friday earning Penn State’s fourth win of the season.
On Saturday, Penn State crushed No.2 Stanford with a sold-out crowd of nearly 1,800 fans making this the first time in program history that the Nittany Lions swept Stanford at home in Rec Hall.
Four players also recorded double figure kills; Sophomore Hayleigh Washington had 12, sophomore Ali Frantti and redshirt senior Aiyana Whitney each had 13, and senior Megan Courtney had 11.
Hayleigh Washington (Colorado Springs, Colo.) earned the Big Ten Co-Player of the Week honors for the second time, shared by Ohio State’s Taylor Sandbothe. This is Washington’s fourth career total Big Ten Weekly honor, not including a pair of Big Ten Freshman of the Week in 2014.
Frantti, led the offense with a season-high performance logging in 13 kills, five digs, and one block.
Whitney had 13 kills on .440 hitting with three blocks and one dig. She also reached double figures in kills in four out of five matches this season thus far.
Courtney earned her second double-double to begin a solid season with 11 kills and 13 digs marking her third consecutive match with 10 or more digs.
Washington also earned the Big Ten/Pac-12 Challenge MVP honors. She led the team with 3.33 kills per set on .515 hitting in the 2-0 week while finishing second on the team with 1.17 blocks per set with back-to-back multi block performances.
Washington, Courtney, and Whitney were chosen as the all-tournament team.
Redshirt freshman Bryanna Weiskircher is starting off the season strong tallying a career high 41 assists packing the team to a .327 hitting clip. She also paced four of her top attackers to double figure kills against Stanford.
Sophomore Simone Lee recorded a pair of season-high marks with three kills on .500 hitting and one block against Colorado.
The Nittany Lions (now 5-0) will be headed to South Bend, Indiana for the Gold Dome Individual this week.
They will take on Eastern Kentucky (0-7) on Friday, Sept. 11 at 4:30 p.m. ET with a double header on Saturday against Mississippi State (6-1) at 10:30 a.m. ET followed by Notre Dame (2-4) at 7:00 p.m. ET.
