The Penn volleyball team may have recorded its last upset of the season. From here on out it could be the favorite.
The Quakers (6-5) defeated a strong Villanova team (9-6) in three games last night.
"We are an upset team this year," coach Kerry Carr said. "They dominated us 3-0 last year and the year before; tonight we dominated them 3-0. We are that good and I think some people are starting to realize it."
There was a clear difference between last night and previous years.
"The energy and attitude going into the match was so different from the last two years," captain Laura Black said. "Even when they had a couple runs on us we kept our composure and kept fighting."
No star player emerged from the victory, which Black maintained was a team effort.
"People covered and made good plays when it wasn't a great set or pass."
Black led the team with 10 kills. The Texas duo of Anna Shlimak and Julia Swanson each added nine kills behind a respectable team attack percentage of .243.
The win was not without a hiccup in the last game. After game scores of 30-28 and 30-20 the Quakers fell behind 19-12 in the third game.
"You always hope that your team stays focused after you dominate games one and two, but there is a tendency to relax a bit," Carr said. "You try to prepare your team for it, and I hope that we have learned our lesson."
Carr stayed with her starting rotation - Black, Swanson, Shlimak, Linda Zhang, Madison Wojciechowski, Natalie Drucker and Kathryn Turner - until the Quakers got in trouble.
Then the coach tried juggling the roster, making her first substitutions of the match. She put in sophomore Jesse Yeager and freshman Megan Tryon, trying to swing the momentum in the Quakers' favor.
When that didn't work, she brought the starters back in, and they were able to right the ship. The Quakers fought back with an 18-4 run and won 30-23.
"We had a small bump," Black said. "No one thought we were going lose. No one hung their head; we just refocused and took control."
With this big victory in the books, plus another against Temple over the weekend, the Quakers are sure other teams will take notice.
"Teams will definitely go hard and not overlook us," Black said.
Princeton, who is next up on Penn's docket, might now be looking past the Quakers' fourth-place finish in the league last year.
It took Princeton, who finished second in the league last season, five games to beat the Wildcats earlier this season, setting up a competitive match for the Ivy opener this Saturday.
