Kelly saves the day (after almost losing it)! I’m sure Larry will give us a more precise report!
End of year Penn State sports wrap-up
Just for sake of completeness, I thought I’d give everyone a final wrap-up (OK asemi-final wrap-up – we still have a bowl game left but that’s next year 🙂 ) of the PSU Fall sports scene. My hospitalization three weeks ago got in the way of my weekend posts and it turns out my superstitious fears were justified.
In case you don’t remember, Penn State’s five fall sports programs (football, women’s volleyball, field hockey, and men’s and women’s soccer) had gone through an unprecedented Big Ten season. The teams each won a Big Ten championship going a combined 49-1 with the sole loss being the football teams last second loss at Michigan. Each of the teams advanced to post season play (the football team is headed to the Orange Bowl while the other four squads all competed in NCAA tournaments.
As I reported earlier, the #8 ranked Field Hockey team was the first to taste defeat when they lost to #6 ranked American University. As I’ve also previously mentioned, UncleLar niece Natalie Berrena (shown here with me during our Santa Crawl) was named first team All-American.
The next team to fall by the wayside was the men’s soccer team. The guys won their first two NCAA matches to make it to the Sweet Sixteen but fell to Creighton in a 3-1 loss at home. That loss happened while I was in the hospital.
The women’s soccer team had more success. The made it to the College Cup, soccer’s equivalent of the Final Four, the weekend after I was hospitalized. Unfortunately, the way that the College Cup draw worked, #2 ranked Penn State had to meet #1 ranked Portland in the semifinals. Both Penn State and Portland were undefeated going into their semifinal match and the consensus opinion was that the victor of this game would probably take home the national championship. The two teams battled to a 0-0 first half tie. This was the first time all year that Portland had been held scoreless in the first half of their game. That defensive battle continued as both teams failed to score in the second half also. They continued play through two 10 minute sudden death overtimes, so after 110 minutes of soccer play neither team was able to eke out a goal. They meant that the winner would be determined by a shoot-out. Portland’s two time Hermann Trophy winner (soccer’s equivalent to the Heisman trophy) nailed the final kick of the shootout to give Portland the 4-3 shootout win. Because the game ended in a shootout, it will go into the record book as a tie. That means that Penn State becomes the first undefeated team in NCAA soccer history to not win the title. As expected Portland went on to claim the crown with a 4-0 victory over UCLA two days later.
Two weekends after my operation, the women’s volleyball team took on Tennessee in the NCAA Regional Semifinal. The regionals were being held on Penn State’s home court and the #2 ranked Nittany Lions were huge favorites to win at home and advanced to the Final Four. Unfortunately, one of Penn State’s star players, Christa Harmotta, had gone down with a season ending injury in Penn State’s last home regular season match and the loss showed. Tennessee pulled off a huge upset knocking off Penn State in four games (that made three staight weekends where one of our teams lost – all no doubt due to my failure to make my regular weekend blog post). The Lady Vols then went on to beat Missouri the next day and advanced to the Final Four.
Two of UncleLar’s volleyball buddies did receive post season honors however. Senior libero Kaleena Walters (also shown here in a Santa Crawl photo) was named B10 Ten Defensive Player of the Year and third team All-American.
Senior setter Sam Tortorello (of course in a Santa Crawl photo) was a unanimous pick as B10 Player of the Year and was also named a first team All-American.
Since the bowl game is scheduled for next year, i.e. January 3rd, I thought this would a good time to make a year end wrap up. As promissed, you won’t have to put up with all these sports reports in the future (of course, that’s partially because our basketball team sucks so much – we did beat New Hampshire (sorry Shannon) this week though).
I’m home
was released form the hospital about a half hour ago. Just enough time to let everyone know I’m all right and to still make tipoff of tonight’s ESPN ACC/Big Ten Challenge match. It’s being broadcast by ESPNU and I will be in my regular seat 5 rows behind the visitors bench – I’m on the aisle on your right.
I know my field hockey
As I predicted weeks ago, Natalie Berrena was named first team All-American by the National Field Hockey Coaches Association. It caps a wonderful career for Natalie, moving up from a walk-on here at her hometown school to being named captain and All-American her senior season. To put in in perspective, Rudy had a movie made about him and he only got in for a play. 🙂
I’ve been keeping an eye on the NFHCA website because I knew they were overdue to announce the AA’s (their website said they were going to release it yesterday), so I was actually the first to find out. I texted Natalie on her phone to let her know and got this back from her “I can’t believe it! You called it back in sept and I laughed at you… Ha! Who would have thought! I’m seriously in shock.” Nat is truly very humble and doesn’t realize how gifted she is (both athletically and artistically) so her surprise is real.
While I recognized that she was playing good hockey, I also knew that her story would hit home with both the media and coaches. “Local kid walks on, leads home team to championship” just works on all fronts – it’s a great story lead for the press and coaches can hold it up as “you too can do this” example to recruits. Plus, I know her coach well – Char really likes Nat and I knew that Char would likely choose Nat to push for post season awards, so I’m not quite as clairvoyant as I might appear.
I’m not normally a superstitious person
But since I started posting these weekend updates the teams keep winning, so I can’t stop now.
As I’ve already reported, the football team knocked off Michigan State to win the B10 title. Following the team’s return to Happy Valley (the photo on the right shows Michael Robinson carrying the B10 championship trophy into Rec Hall for a welcome back rally Saturday night), a bunch of fans took over the downtown streets celebrating the turnaround season. The B10 championship meant that Penn State had now claimed all five fall regular season Big Ten team championships, a first in B10 history (the previous record had been three fall championships).
The women’s volleyball team was in action on Friday and Saturday also. On Friday, the women swept #19 Minnesota 3-0. They followed that with another 3-0 sweep, this time over Iowa, on senior night. In the photo on the left, three of my Facebook buddies, Sam Tortorello, Cassy Salyer, and Kaleena Walters, are shown holding the B10 volleyball championship trophy (Sam and Kaleena are seniors and were honored before the match). The girls extended their B10 record to 18-0 and can close out a perfect season with away victories this coming weekend. If the girls can win those matches, and they will be heavy favorites to do so, the fall sports programs’ Big Ten record will be an absolutely phenomenal 49-1 (the sole loss be a the controversal last second football loss to Michigan).
Just for completeness sake, I must comment on the other fall sports. Field hockey’s season is over – the only think left to report is whether “Grand Niece” Natalie Berrena makes All-American or not (the announcement is due later today). Women’s soccer continued their march through the NCAA tournament with a 4-1 win over Texas A&M on Saturday afternoon (Saturday was a busy day for me – caught the Penn State men’s basketball win over Cornell at 12:30, rushed over to the soccer field to catch the end of the 1:00 women’s NCAA soccer game, headed downtown to Bill Pickle’s Tavern to meet up with friends to watch the Nit’s 4:00 football win over MSU, zipped up to Recreation Hall in time to cheer the 8:00 girls volleyball team on in the Iowa win, then closed the evening out listening to “JR and Natalie” at Cafe 210 – first set at 10:30) – it’s days like this that make me love Happy Valley). The women now meet Santa Clara here Friday – with a win they advance to the Final Four in College Station TX.
The men’s soccer team will open NCAA play with a match against Seton Hall here tomorrow. The men have earned an 11th seed but are considered one of the more dangerous teams in the tournament coming into the tournament riding a nine game winning streak holding a win over the #1 seed Maryland Terrapins and two wins over the #3 seed Indiana Hoosiers. They should be a force to be reckoned with.
Just in case you are wondering if I am going to be publishing these tomes every week, have no fear. I have no intention of continuing to type them up. It’s just that the teams have made this remarkable run this fall and I didn’t want to do anything to jinx them. Once we get the NCAA championships out of the way in soccer and volleyball, and the bowl game in football, I will cease and desist from my weekly reports.
Penn State has next
I love the title of this article
If USC or Texas stumbles, Penn State has next: “It was well after midnight, East Coast time, when the notion became clear. Hey, maybe this USC-Texas match-up in the Rose Bowl isn’t a done deal, after all. Not yet, at least.
USC’s 50-42 escape against Fresno State reinforced the reality that two more weeks of games are remaining. And even though the Trojans and Longhorns are the only unbeaten teams left in Division I-A, something crazy still could happen.
What then? What if there’s a BCS free-for-all?”
In case you didn’t see this before
About 10 days ago, in my “Ken – remember this?” post, I said:
Just like this year, PSU was hot in the middle of the football national championship picture
Gary came back with:
BTW, Is PSU really “hot in the middle of the football national championship picture “?
And I responded:
Most definitely we are. We are fifth in the BCS. That means we need three teams in front of us to lose to get into the BCS championship game.The four teams ahead of us and their remaining games are:
Miami: @Wake Forest (4-6), Geo Tech (6-2), Virginia (5-3), then Fla State (7-2) in the conference championship game – none of those games are easy and it will be tough for them to win all four games (Fla St has already beaten them once).
Alabama: LSU (7-1), @Auburn (7-2), and a conference championship game against either Georgia (7-1) or Florida (7-2). Alabama’s offense is atrocious – they haven’t scored a TD in 13 quarters and it would be a big surprise for them to record three wins against the teams they have yet to play.
Texas: Kansas (5-4), @Tex A&M (5-4), and a conference championship game against Colorado (7-2). Anytime you have to defeat three teams with winning records there is a decent chance you could lose. The favorite has a history of losing the conference championship in the B12 so it wouldn’t be too much of a surprise to see the Longhorns go down.
USC: @California (6-3), Fresno State (7-1), and UCLA (8-1). While Southern Cal looks to be the strongest contender for the national championship they do have challenges ahead of them. None of those teams are pushovers and UCLA would just love to knock their cross town rivals out of the BCS picture.
Penn State on the other hand has two weeks to get ready for their sole remaining game with Michigan State (5-4). MSU is in their usual late season collapse having lost 4 of their last 5 games. We should be able to handle them easily and just sit back and watch the others fall by the wayside.
The good news is that only three of the four teams in front of us need to lose. There is a very good chance that could happen.
Here’s an update of what has happened since:
Just as I suggested, we were able to beat Michigan State and capture the B10 title and secure a berth in a BCS Bowl. Which bowl is still up in the air.
Last week, Alabama lost to LSU in overtime and dropped out of the national championship picture.
Yesterday, Miami lost to Georgia Tech and their national championship hopes have been dashed.
So two of the three things that needed to happen have. We just need one more and we almost got that late last night (people were glued to TV’s in the bars here in State College last night as the USC/Fresno State game didn’t end until 2:15AM).
Southern Cal staged a furious comeback and managed to overcome Fresno State 50-42 in a game that saw them trailing 42-41 in the fourth quarter (Fresno State had also led at halftime 21-13). USC looks beatable and they have crosstown rivals UCLA in two weeks.
Texas was off this week but they have always dangerous Texas A&M and their famed 12th man next week, then a conference championship matchup with Colorado in two weeks.
That means there are three chances for an upset to happen – I’d say odds are about 50-50 that one of the upsets will occur – and Penn State can claim a spot in the national championship game in the Rose Bowl (there is also an outside chance that LSU could sneak by us with a win in their conference championship game).
Realistically, there are now only five schools with a shot at the title. USC and Texas still have their destiny in their own hands. Win out and they are in. Penn State’s season is over and we sit just on the outside waiting for one of the two to fail. LSU not only needs one of the top two to falter but they also need to win out and start getting some love from the BCS computers. Virginia Tech remains a very big long shot to somehow sneak into the game – they probably need both teams on the top to lose and have LSU also lose while they win out and meet Penn State for the title.
So that’s a long winded way of saying “Yes, Gary we very much are in the middle of the national championship picture.
NA-TA-LIE
Two weeks ago, the Penn State women’s field hockey team had their final home game of the season against Ohio State. The weather was kind of miserable, damp and overcast with a slight drizzle, but I went up to the game anyway because it was senior day – i.e. the day when they honor the graduating players – and it would be the final game that Natalie Berrena would play at home for Penn State plus she was going to sing the National Anthem for her fellow seniors before the game.
When I got up there, I ran into one of Natalie’s friends, Lisa Plesko, who was on the phone when I got there. As I walked up, she snapped her phone closed clearly irritated. When I asked what was wrong, she shrugged her shoulder and shook her head saying she was really pissed at her friends. When I asked why, she pulled up her jacket revealing a shirt with a big NA on it saying that she had made up these shirts to wear for Natalie but her two friends were hung over and complaining about the weather so she didn’t think they were going to make it to the game. I told her not to worry, I’d fix the problem.
I was quite willing to don a shirt plus I knew another kid, Jason Mattia, at the game who I was sure I could talk into it without any trouble – he had graduated last year but had been a PA announcer for the field hockey team the year before so he knew Natalie and a bunch of the girls. Plus one of the gigs that he had here at PSU was to dress like Captain Morgan for various promotions around town, so I knew he would be an easy sell. It took all of two seconds for him to agree. We all decided to wait until halftime to put the shirts on.
As it turns out, one of Lisa’s friends did show up right at halftime, so we did need Jason’s services (you really didn’t think I’d be the one to sit it out did you?). We changed into the shirts just before the start of the second half and stood by the fence at Penn State’s end of the field hoping she would notice us. As luck would have it, just seconds into the second half there was an out of bounds play right in front of us. The ball was off a Penn State player, so Ohio State had possession and had to inbounds it right in front of us. Natalie stood defending about 15 yards away and, since we were right behind the inbounding Ohio State player, had a direct view of us. Right in the middle of the play, she spots us and just starts shaking her head laughing. We couldn’t have planned it any better.
She called me this afternoon and told me that someone had sent her a photo of the three of us. She had copies made for us and I went over tonight and picked up mine.
Here I am, just living a “LIE”.
PS – Natalie received another honor today when she was named to the National Field Hockey Coaches All Region first team. She has an excellent shot at making All-American and it would be a fantastic way to end her field hockey career.
No football game but still plenty of sports news
While Penn State didn’t play football this weekend there still was plenty of news in both other sports and on the pigskin front. In the middle of the “Ken – remember this?” thread, right after Gary questioned my comment about PSU being in the middle of the national championship picture, I documented three things that needed to happen for PSU to get into the national championship game (well, three things out of their control, four things if you count beating Michigan State as one of the requirements). Well one of them happened as Alabama went down to defeat at the hands of LSU, so now Penn State sits fourth in the BCS standings. That leaves two to go with three weeks of football left.
One sports season came to an end on Saturday. The 8th ranked Penn State women’s field hockey team went down to defeat to 6th ranked American University in NCAA playoff action.
Big Ten Offensive Player of the Year Natalie Berrena scored the first goal of the game to give the Nits a 1-0 lead but American came back with 3 straight goals and eventually won 3-2 eliminating the Nits from the NCAA tournament.
The girls’ loss turned out to be JR Mangan’s gain. Immediately following the game held at the University of Maryland, the team returned to State College where Natalie was able to join her band “JR and Natalie” for their second and third sets at the Cafe 210 here in State College. This time, Uncle Larry finally remembered to bring his camera and caught the band in action. This is my favorite shot from the batch. 🙂
The women’s volleyball team swept two matchs over the weekend, sweeping both Purdue and Illinois. With the Illinois win, the girls clinched their third straight and ninth overall Big Ten title.
Speaking of Big Ten titles, the men’s soccer team added the Big Ten Tournament title to their regular season title by shutting out both Michigan State 2-0 and defending national champion Indiana 1-0. Indiana had been the #2 ranked team in the county coming into the game. They had lost only one game all year – not so coincidently that game was to Penn State and it happened on national TV in Bloomington. This is the first time ever that Penn State has beaten traditional national power Indiana twice in a season. The Nits also own a win over #1 ranked Maryland so they must be considered a force to be reckoned with during the NCAA tournament which starts this weekend (Penn State will find out who their opponent is when the pairings are announced at 5PM today – UPDATE: PSU received a ninth seed, thus earning a first round bye and will host the Hartwick/Seton Hall winner on Tuesday Nov 22nd). The two B10 titles capped an unbelievable turnaround for this team which lost 5 and tied 1 in their first six games of the season. At the beginning of October this team had 3 wins 7 losses and 2 ties. Since then they have won TEN in a row and are a legitimate threat to win the national title – nobody is playing as well as they are right now.
And while we are on the subject of NCAA soccer we can’t overlook the PSU women. As a result of their loss in the Big Ten tournament the women slipped to #3 overall in the national soccer rankings. However, they have bounced right back and have already defeated two opponents, Bucknell 6-0, and West Virginia 5-2. The girls will now meet Texas A&M in Sweet Sixteen at a site TBD.
The four B10 wins over the weekend brought our fall sports overall B10 record to 45-3. We have now totalled five B10 championships (four regular season crowns and one tournament crown) and can bring the total to six with a win over Michigan State by the football team this weekend. Quite a successful Fall and certainly worthy of an entry in the “Legends of the Falls” (pun intended) Blog.
Penn State vs. Notre Dame?
UncleLar (BroLar),
So what are the odds and what has to take place for Penn State to end up playing Notre Dame in a bowl game? I’ve got a household full of “golden domers”, not to mention Mary Ann’s entire family. I’d like nothing better than to watch Penn State beat Notre Dame somewhere on New Year’s Day.