When the Blue Devils stepped on the court Saturday night at Penn State’s Rec Hall, they knew they were in for a long night.
Not only did the Nittany Lions (30-5), the fourth seed, have the home court advantage, but they also have not lost an NCAA Tournament match since 2006. It wasn’t that surprising, then, when Duke quickly lost the match’s first two sets.
But down two sets, the 12th-seeded Blue Devils (27-7) came out of the locker room and finished the third set with a rejuvenating 25-23 victory to stave off Penn State. And after going point-for-point for most of the fourth set, it looked like the match was headed toward five sets.
“In the third set, it was definitely a feeling of, ‘We can do this,’” said junior Sophia Dunworth, who was one of two Duke players named to the University Park, Pa. Regional All-Tournament team. “At this point, we knew we weren’t in over our heads… we could taste the potential victory. In the fourth set, I think it was still hopeful, and we were still coming together... but we definitely had our backs up against the wall.”
But the Nittany Lions were not about to admit defeat. They quickly took over the momentum, pushing to 24-14 before Duke went on a 3-0 run that ended unsuccessfully, causing the Blue Devils to bow out after going further in the NCAA Tournament than at any other time in school history.
“They put pressure on us from the very beginning,” head coach Jolene Nagel said. “And I wouldn’t say [this] was our best night by any means, but that happens whenever you play a strong opponent. We had no intention to end tonight.”
To get to the Penn State match, Duke won in four sets against Missouri Friday night to advance to the Regional final.
“We have a tremendous, hard-working group, and they’ve really built a strong foundation for Duke Volleyball to come,” Nagel said. “There are some things execution-wise that we are certainly capable of doing better like serve-receive.… But I’m really proud of this team and how they’ve worked together.”
Saturday, Duke had trouble finishing points, leading to low hitting percentages—under nine percent in two sets. The Nittany Lions, on the other hand, were able to effectively bypass the Blue Devils defense, which had held opponents to a .169 hitting percentage, by coming away with percentages of .405, .243, .163 and .293 over the course of the match.
The biggest part of Penn State’s game that Duke had to overcome was its tough blockers, who recorded 17 total blocks for the match to the Blue Devils’ seven.
“We needed to make some adjustments, which we did as the match went on, but it took us too long to do that,” Nagel said. “I think if we had been passing a little better, we could have tested [them] a bit more with serve receives and controlling the ball on defensive digs.”
Despite a disappointing finish for the Blue Devils, they are proud of how far they have come and how close they have gotten as a team.
“It was just us playing for each other,” senior captain Becci Burling said. “In the third set, we came out and played for one another. We forgot about who we were playing against, where we were playing at and looked each other in the eye and said, ‘Let’s go for it out here’.... We were just playing for each other.”
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