Once more, all preambles have been said. Ball don’t lie? Well, let’s hear what ball got to say.
Penn State took the tiniest of leads early, but Ben Patch quickly erased it, finding the floor three different times in three different ways (kill, solo block, service ace) to put the Cougars on top at 5-4. A Devin Young/Russ Lavaja double block put the Cougars ahead two for the first time at 7-5. Penn State fell behind four at 11-7 when Aaron Russell missed a pretty wide seam in the double block and went angle when he didn’t need to, the ball flying wide untouched. Penn State coach Mark Pavlik called his first timeout there. Young got another block after the timeout to put the Cougars up five, before Ryan Boyce‘s run on serve finally ended with a service error. An ace for Young extended the lead to six at 15-9 before Russell the elder, that’s Peter Russell, got the Lions the sideout. The Cougars looked a little out of system on the rally at 15-11, but they covered all Penn State block touches adeptly and eventually Sander found the kill off a back-set to the pipe. Penn State were able to do little more than side out occasionally, and burned their second timeout down 18-12.
The Nittany Lions came up with a nice kill to sideout on the first rally after the timeout, setter Taylor Hammond finding Nick Goodell on the right side for a twisty-turny kill. But the Cougars’ fifth block of the first set made it 20-13, and it was starting to look like a bit of a mismatch. Penn State pulled back one with Turko on serve at 21-15, but the BYU block was not to be denied. The Cougars reached set point at 24-17. Penn State rallied with three straight to force BYU’s timeout. The run continued after the timeout with an attacking error from Patch. It looked like it might have extended further with another service ace for Aaron Russell, as the ball trickled over the net and down. His last serve actually hit middle blocker Matt Seifert‘s right hand before going over, and the eagle-eyed El Bigote (that’s Boyce) pointed it out on the brief BYU side. A brief officials’ conference later, and it was 25-21 BYU in the 1st.
Both sides had 11 kills in the first set, but where Penn State had 9 attacking errors (on 7 BYU blocks), BYU had only two, both of them late on Russell’s service run at the end. Sander led the way for the Cougars with 5 for an errorless 7. Penn State didn’t have a block in set number 1.
The teams traded points for quite a while to begin set 2. Penn State did a solid job of finding what minor mismatches at the net that they could, though BYU continued their run of blocking supremacy. It wasn’t strictly sideout after sideout, but we were into double digits before anyone went ahead by 2. BYU curiously took a timeout trailing 9-8 in the midst of this pretty dead-even stretch of points. At 11-10, easily the longest rally of the match with some good digs on both sides, BYU appeared to have that first 2-point edge on a Nittany Lion hitting error, but a delayed touch call came to give the kill to Nick Goodell for Penn State’s point. After siding out, the Cougars rotated Patch to service, and the national freshman of the year gave BYU a 2-point lead at 13-11 with an ace, prompting Penn State to call time.
BYU went up 3 for the first time on the set on another play that bore a second look, as Patch’s swing definitely hit the antenna — but replays showed it hit the Penn State blocker first, for point BYU. Sander followed with a kill on just his third swing of the set to make it 17-13 Cougars, and the Nittany Lions called time. Fuchs remained on serve after the timeout and uncorked his second ace of the season to put BYU up five. A Penn State hitting error made it 19-13, and a block for Young and Sander made it 20-13. A service error sided out the Nittany Lions out, and a visibly pumped Lavaja met him at the sideline as he subbed back in (only to himself leave the match again for the libero Jaylen Reyes). In perhaps BYU’s best offensive rotation, with Boyce on service and three big scorers in the front row, they extended to an 8-point lead at 22-14. BYU remarkably reached set point at 24-15, and with only a Devin Young zone fault to side Penn State out once, 25-16 was the final.
Penn State still had zero blocks for the night through two sets. Patch and Sander had between them 15 kills on 28 attempts, with just a single error. The Nittany Lions finally got their first block of the night on the rally ending 3-1, and it was the setter Taylor Hammond coming up with it, as Penn State’s rotation was a little different in set 2 with the middle blockers separate. Hammond got no help on the block, with Ian Hendries playing to the opposite pin. 3-1 itself was then one of the longest rallies of the match, ending with Aaron Russell finding the floor through the triple block to give Penn State their biggest lead of the night at 4-1. Sander appeared to have a kill from the pipe on 4-1, and while replays were showing his swing, the officials changed their call to give the point to the Nittany Lions. It was therefore unclear what the call was. Another solo block for Penn State, this one by Peter Russell, made it 6-1 Nittany Lions, and BYU called time.
The Cougars took three of four out of the timeout, but Penn State extended their advantage afterward, an atypically poor middle attack from Lavaja for an error straight into the net to make it 9-4 Nittany Lions. But no matter — the Cougars responded with three in a row again to make it to back to within 9-7. Boyce started this set as he did the first two, but Tyler Heap subbed in to bring them back from the brink. After 9-7, it was sideout after sideout for a little while. Finally on BYU’s serve at 15-13 they crawled back within one, a long rally ending with Patch’s 11th kill of the night. Penn State re-established their 3-point lead at 18-15 after a very long rally, ending with a really smart hit by Aaron Russell as he changed direction and took a lot of the pepper out of swing while in midair. BYU went to their most advantageous rotation at 19-16, with Heap on the service line and Patch, Sander, and Michael Hatch in the front row, and they capitalised, making it back to within one with a great shot for a kill by Sander and an ace for Heap, just the second of his season. Penn State called time at 19-18, meaning all four timeouts for the set were spent.
Aaron Russell sided the Nittany Lions out for his 13th kill of the night, but BYU kept it within a point with a left-side double block, their first of the set, to energise the fans they had brought with them to Pauley Pavilion. When Patch found the floor on the next rally, that made it 20-all and a race to five with no timeouts available to either side. At 21-all, Sander came up with the kill from the back row, which preceded Hatch’s service ace to put the Cougars two points from the sweep. Another Sander kill made it match point at 24-22, and Josue Rivera set up an all-MPSF final for the second straight year with the final kill.
#1 BYU d. #4 Penn State (25-21, 25-16, 25-22)
Frankly even this was a little bit closer than I was expecting. But for a weird run to close out the 1st, when it was too late to make much of a difference, and the beginning of the 3rd, Penn State were well behind all night long. And I don’t necessarily mean the scoreboard, I mean a step or three behind. There was a pretty clear gulf in talent on the court tonight. Good on the Nittany Lions for making it this far, and it’s not like they didn’t deserve it (they achieved what they needed to to make the NCAA tournament), but there was never really any doubt in this one.
Aaron Russell led the Nittany Lions with 13 kills. Nobody else reached double digits, and aside from a single late kill for Matt Seifert, only the three pin hitters (the Russells and Nick Goodell) scored at all, at least in terms of kills. Penn State got their only two blocks of the match in the 3rd, and tightened up their offence considerably, committing just one attacking error in the final frame, but it was never going to equal what BYU were doing. After 11 kills in each of the first two sets, the Cougars ratcheted up the front-line offence, getting 18 in set 3 and still managing a .300 efficiency. They hit .345 for the night to Penn State’s .151. Sander led all scorers with 17 kills, and Patch added 12. It was not a great hitting night for the BYU middles, combining for a downright motley 6/5/18, but 12.5 total team blocks in three sets gets you off the hook a little.
So our national final is BYU vs. UC Irvine. Should be a great one!
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