The volleyball team's four-game winning streak hit a wall yesterday, as the team suffered a loss to the Villanova Wildcats, 24-30, 25-30, 22-30.
Despite a strong start and competitive play in every game - there were a total of 14 tie scores and six lead changes - the Quakers (4-6) couldn't quite overcome the Wildcats (7-9).
The Quakers began the match with high energy. They jumped out to an early lead aided by freshman Natalie Drucker in her first start in the Palestra.
In her first game back since suffering a knee injury, Linda Zhang made an immediate impact with strategic touches and some great digs.
"It felt great. I've been waiting to get back since I hurt myself," Zhang said of her return.
Penn's enthusiasm, however, would soon turn to frustration as Villanova clawed back to tie the first game at 21 apiece. The Wildcats won that game and the next two as the Quakers struggled to get any type of momentum going.
"We let them have runs," captain Liz Hurst said. "If we could have stopped them after one or two points, we could have stayed closer. What we need to work on is stopping them earlier so we stay in the game longer."
The Quakers' inability to get their serves in play also took its toll - the team had 12 service errors. Many of these errors came at key points when the Red and Blue had started to mount a run.
"Honestly, you get some days where balls want to float more than others, and it struck the whole team," Hurst said. "It will definitely be something we focus on in practice this week."
A frustrated coach Kerry Carr said the Quakers "lost their focus" at times and were not as aggressive as she would have liked.
"Villanova is a better team on paper," Carr said. "They play in a better conference, they have full-ride scholarship athletes, but I still felt, at any time, we could have beat them if we were aggressive, going after the pass, going after the serve.
"The reason why they won was because they were a better team tonight. They were mentally tougher than we were during the stretches where both teams were not serve-receiving well."
Even though Penn got swept yesterday, the team had an opportunity to win each game.
"If we pass well, we can beat anybody," Hurst said.
Despite changing liberos and setters after the first two games, Penn never held the lead in the third game.
Now, the Quakers are faced with the daunting task of preparing for an undefeated Princeton team in their first Ivy League matchup of the season.
"We may need to go back to the drawing board," Carr said.
NOTES: Laura Black, Anna Shlimak and Elizabeth Semmens were named to the Sheraton-Penn Invitational all-tournament team over the weekend, with Black named tournament MVP. Semmens was also named Ivy League Co-Rookie of the Week.
