Weekend split gets Volleyball first win in Kerry Major era

This weekend the Penn volleyball team continued to a take a step in the right direction. Despite losing 3-1 at LaSalle (8-3) on Saturday, Penn (1-3) easily shut out Lafayette (0-9) the previous day. In coach Kerry Major's home debut the Quakers, led by senior Sue Sabatino's eight kills and junior K.C. Potter's ten digs and eight kills, handed Lafayette its ninth consecutive 3-0 loss of the season by the scores of 15-2, 15-8, 15-2. "We're very young and we're struggling right now," Lafayette coach Kathy Carbone said. "Our goal was to play the best we could, and we didn't. In the second game we played about five good points and that's it." Lafayette played competitively for most of the second game. The Leopards led 8-6 until Penn tallied nine unanswered points. The highlight of the match came when Penn earned its 15th point of game two. After freshman Kelly Szczerba's amazing dig -- one of five in the match -- and several volleys, Sabatino slammed down the kill to win the second game. "It was a long rally," Major said. "You can always get carried away with emotion. If you win those, you can win the big games." The long rally energized the Quakers, who scored the last 11 points of the entire match, including two on junior Kristen Stine's aces. Coming off their first win of the season, the Quakers played well in the first game the following night against LaSalle. In a come-from-behind effort the Quakers outscored LaSalle 15-13 in game one. Nevertheless, LaSalle stormed back and won the match, 13-15, 15-4, 15-2, 15-10. "The score wasn't as close as the game," freshman setter Jodie Antypas said. "We didn't give up. We could have just rolled over and died." LaSalle was led by Missy McCulty, who had 21 kills. McCulty also contributed 13 digs to the defensive cause, second only to Autumn Krauss' 19. "LaSalle is a great defensive team, and they kept putting the ball back on our side," Major said. The Explorers weren't the only team with defensive stars. Freshman Stephanie Horan led the Red and Blue with 13 digs. Penn's top performer of the game was Antypas. "Jodie did a good job with setting decisions and running the court," Major said. Antypas ran Penn's offense throughout all four games, accumulating twenty-seven of the Quakers' thirty sets. She also contributed five digs and two kills to Penn's cause. LaSalle's experience playing together and their extra two weeks of practice proved to be the difference. "They were a better team last night," Major said. "You have to give them credit." The Quakers' 1-1 record this weekend is an improvement after opening the season 0-2. Moreover, they showed mental toughness and received several good individual performances. Penn looks to uphold their undefeated home record and to continue improvement tomorrow versus Loyola at the Palestra.