PHILADELPHIA – The University of Pennsylvania volleyball team got off to a slow start Friday night at The Palestra and never recovered, allowing Ivy League preseason favorite Yale to roll to a 3-0 victory.
 
Set scores were 25-12, 25-19, 25-19.
 
Penn lost its third in a row and fell to 6-6 overall, 0-2 in Ivy play (having played the top two teams in the preseason poll). Yale improved to 6-4 overall, 2-0 in conference action.
 
Quaker Notemeal
*Tough night on attack for Penn, which hit just .114 for the match and had its fewest kills (31) since the season opener against Colorado (29).
 
*Junior Zada Sanger was the Quakers' leader in kills with 11, her eighth straight match with a double-digit total.
 
*Sophomore Ellie Siskin was second in that category with six, hitting .200 (6K-1E-25A). She also recorded eight digs and a service ace, adding to her team lead (10).
 
*Freshman libero Addison Pollock finished with 15 digs to lead Penn in that category, while sophomore setter Emery Moore had 12 and sophomore Jenna Garner added 11.
 
*Moore also had 22 assists, a kill and an ace.
 
*Freshman Nathalie Tsai came on in the third set as a service specialist and made it pay off, serving up an ace on her first touch.
 
*Garner had four kills, as did junior Bella Rittenberg and sophomore Adell Murray. Garner also led the Red and Blue with three block assists while Murray had two.
 
How It Happened
SET 1 (Yale 25-12): The Bulldogs set the tone early, scoring the first three points on Friday night. Penn got back to within 6-4, at which point Yale reeled off seven straight points as the Quakers burned both of their timeouts. The run continued until the score was 19-6, ultimately a 13-2 stretch, and the Red and Blue never got closer than 11 points the rest of the way. Garner had three kills and two block assists.
 
SET 2 (Yale (25-19): Much more competitive, the teams tying six times and the Quakers leading by as much as 9-5 after a Siskin kill that punctuated a four-point run. The lead was still four, at 15-11, when out of the media timeout Yale turned on the burners—the Bulldogs ran off four straight points and eight of the next nine, turning a four-point deficit into a three-point lead. A Siskin kill was followed by a Yale attack error, making the score 19-18, and another Siskin kill made it 20-19, but the Bulldogs scored the next five points to win the set going away. Sanger had four kills while Siskin finished with three, and Pollock had nine digs in the set.
 
SET 3 (Yale 25-19): This set was level at 7-7 when Yale scored four points, forcing a Penn timeout. The Bulldogs' lead bulged to 16-9—a 9-2 run doing the damage—before Penn used a 4-1 run to get within four at 17-13. A Rittenberg kill made it 19-16, bringing about a Yale timeout, and out of the stoppage the Bulldogs scored two points in a row to get some late separation. A final Siskin kill fended off one match point, but Yale closed it out at 25-19. Sanger put down six kills, while Rittenberg and Siskin added three apiece.
 
Up Next
Penn closes out this four-match homestand tomorrow night, hosting Brown at 5 p.m.
 
For the latest on Penn volleyball, follow @PennVolleyball on X (formerly Twitter) and Instagram, and on the web at PennAthletics.com.