Maryland volleyball falls to Penn State in four sets

Photo courtesy of Austin Desisto/Maryland Terrapin

During its three-game win streak, Maryland volleyball (13-14, 4-12 Big Ten) played like an entirely different team than the rest of the season. In perhaps their most anticipated game this year against No. 4 Penn State (24-2, 14-1 Big Ten), the Terps reverted to their old self.

Penn State downed Maryland 3-1 on Sunday, far outmatching the Terps in three of the four sets.

The sold-out Pavilion was amped up early in the first set when Maryland went tit-for-tat with one of the nation’s best.

The crowd exploded after consecutive aces from the nation’s ace leader Samantha Schnitta tied the match at six. After the Terps fell down one, Penn State’s Camryn Hannah rattled off three straight kills. 

Shortly after, two excellent digs from defensive specialist Jonna Spohn and setter Zoe Huang electrified the gym once again and sparked hope for the Terps, though it was short-lived.

Maryland allowed another three-point run after Hannah’s streak, extending the deficit to six.

Maryland’s fatal flaw against ranked opponents this season has been surrendering scoring runs that dug a hole it couldn’t get out of.

Facing one of the most talented teams in the nation, the Terps once again failed to build runs of their own after falling behind.

A four-point run effectively sealed the match with a 20-11 lead Penn State never relinquished.

Three final kills from Hannah, who ended the set with seven kills on almost .800 hitting, closed out a dominant win for Penn State, 25-13.

The Terps immediately took the court with a different energy in set two.

Penn State opened with a quick 3-0 run, but Maryland refused to back down and fall behind. The Terps battled back to tie the set at 11, hitting more efficiently and stifling the Nittany Lions offense.

From the first to the second set, the Terps nearly doubled their kills (8 to 14) and more than doubled their hitting percentage (.091 to .244). 

With a match-high eight blocks and relentless defensive effort from the back row, Maryland limited Penn State to .167 hitting, over .300 lower than game one.

“We talked in game one, we felt we were scrapping pretty well, we just didn’t feel like we were finishing our hands enough and blocking some balls,” coach Adam Hughes said. “I thought that was a huge change in game two.”

The Terps rattled off a first three-point streak to take an 18-16 lead, then a second 3-0 run to break a tie and close out the set 25-22.

The game two victory marked the first set Maryland took from a ranked opponent since its first matchup against Penn State on Oct. 3.

Maryland’s clutch second set performance in the “red zone,” as Hughes calls it, continued a trend from the recent stretch of wins: when the Terps are the first team to 20 points, they’ve been able to deliver.

Against ranked opponents and a few unranked opponents this season, Maryland rarely reached 20 points first. Even when it did, the Terps seemed to collapse and never were able to finish out sets.

In game two, Maryland upended this trend and outplayed the fourth-ranked team in the nation in crunch time.

But after set two, the Terps never entered the red zone again.

Sets three and four saw the same domination as the first set. In both games, Maryland failed to hit a mere .050, with a .037 hitting percentage in the third set and a flat zero in the fourth.

Penn State rebounded and returned to form in the final two sets, posting 16 kills on a .364 clip in the third and 15 kills on a ridiculous .565 hitting in set four, while the Terps combined for only 10 kills in the last two frames.

“Thought we were playing complementary volleyball in game two,” Hughes said. “And then in game three and four just couldn’t find any sort of offense running.”

Maryland dropped the third set 25-13 and the fourth set 25-15, two games that showed the top-to-bottom talent Penn State has.

Four Nittany Lions finished with double-digit kills, all on more than .350 hitting, led by Camryn Hannah with 17 kills on .500 hitting. Schnitta was the only Terp in double figures (12 kills).

Tonight was the final match of the season in the Xfinity Center Pavilion, as the Terps’ next game in College Park is the season finale against No. 2 Nebraska in the Xfinity Center’s main gym.