PHILADELPHIA – The University of Pennsylvania volleyball team fell dropped a 3-1 (25-19, 25-19, 23-25, 25-19) decision to Yale on Saturday night at The Palestra. With the loss the Quakers fell to 2-5 in Ivy League play and 5-11 overall. The Bulldogs moved to 4-3 in Ivy play and are 11-5 overall.
 
Quaker Notemeal
*Junior captain Autumn Leak—who faced her sister Audrey, a sophomore for the Bulldogs—led Penn with 15 kills and also had five digs and a block assist.
 
*Senior captain Margaret Planek had another 10-kill night, and also had eight digs and a block assist.
 
*Sophomore Emerson Flornes had seven kills, hitting .250 on the night, and also finished with a team-high five blocks (1s/4a).
 
*Senior Daniela Fornaciari also had seven kills as well as a block solo.
 
*Freshman Sydney Ormiston went the distance as Penn's setter on Saturday, dishing out 35 assists and adding eight digs, a block solo, and three kills.
 
*Senior captain Carmina Raquel was back in the libero position again Saturday and led Penn with 14 digs.
 
How It Happened
Penn was plagued by slow starts on Friday against Brown, and the same thing happened on Saturday. Yale scored the first three points of the first set and quickly built that lead up to 8-3 and then 12-5, forcing a Penn timeout. The Quakers came out of the timeout to score two points, but the Bulldogs responded with four in a row to make it 16-7. Down 19-9, Penn came to life with five straight points and eventually got as close as three on a trio of occasions (the last at 22-19) before Yale closed it out with a kill, a Penn attack error, and a service ace.
 
The second set was much closer, Penn actually taking a 14-9 lead on the strength of a four-point run. Yale roared back with five straight points, turning a 15-11 deficit into a 16-15 lead, and then the teams were tied at 16, 17 and 18. At that point, Yale reeled off four straight points, then responded to a Fornaciari kill with three more to take a 2-0 lead in sets.
 
Much like Friday night, Penn's third set was its best. It didn't always look that way, the Quakers falling behind 16-11 midway through the set. However, a Flornes kill was the start of a 7-1 Penn run, putting the Red and Blue up 18-17. The teams then tied at 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, and 23 before kills by Flornes and Leak pushed Penn to the set win.
 
The fourth set was even early on, before a 5-1 Yale run turned a 5-5 tie into a 10-6 Bulldogs lead. The teams essentially traded points until 16-12, when the Bulldogs went on a five-point run that blew the lead out to nine. Penn wasn't done just yet, scoring seven of the next nine points to get within 23-19 and force Yale to take a timeout. The stoppage worked well; Penn committed a service error, and then the Bulldogs got a service ace to close out the match.
 
Up Next
Penn concludes this three-match homestand next Friday when the Quakers host their Ivy League travel partner, Princeton, at 5 p.m. The Tigers are 6-1 in Ivy play after losing to Brown on Saturday night, 3-1.