Volleyball splits weekend series

Last weekend, the Penn volleyball team had the unfortunate pleasure of learning that all good things must eventually come to an end.

After defeating Columbia last Friday at the Palestra in straight games for their seventh consecutive victory, the Quakers returned on Saturday to their home court only to have their winning streak snapped in a straight-game loss to Cornell.

"We basically had to pick up the pace and come out confident," Penn coach Kerry Major said. "But we didn't stay intense the whole game, and you have to do that to beat [Cornell]."

Despite the Big Red's 30-27, 30-27, 30-28 victory over the Quakers, Cornell didn't completely dominate. The two teams were fairly even statistically except in one crucial category.

"Our hitting percentage was much better than theirs, and I think that made the difference," Cornell coach Christie Jackson said. "Our blocking was solid and we got a lot of touches."

The Quakers hit .112, while Cornell (9-4, 3-1 Ivy League) was able to muster a .200 team average. Penn (8-4, 2-1) also had eight more hitting errors -- the combined number of points the Quakers lost by in all three games.

"We didn't hit hard enough against them," Major said. "And when we did give it to them, it was off the block, which is an easy free ball."

Penn's other main problem was failing to stay on top of the Big Red. The Quakers had eight-point leads in games one and three, but Cornell bounced back each time.

"When we got on top of them, we just didn't put them away," Major said. "Cornell never quit. They never thought they were going to lose, and they just kept chipping away. That was very frustrating for my team."

The Quakers, however, had just frustrated Columbia (10-6, 2-2) in a similar manner the night before. The Lions led in the early going of each game on Friday night, only to have Penn's offense heat up late and lead the team to victory.

"We won the game because we pulled it out in pressure situations," Penn junior right-side hitter Stacey Carter said of her team's 34-32, 30-25, 30-27 win. "We started playing well when they were in a position to win. We pulled it out, but we'd like to play well the entire match."

And Major feels that will come if the level of practice improves this week.

"We did not bring our `A' game to practice [last] week, and I told them that they need to change something," Major said. "Then, when we see the next Ivy team, we'll be able to step up from that level, not step up to the level we should have been playing at all along."

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