Cal To Face Penn State In NCAA Women's Volleyball Final

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) -- Penn State will play for a fourth straight NCAA volleyball championship against first-time finalist California.

The Nittany Lions (31-5) and Golden Bears (30-3) swept the semifinals Thursday night, with Penn State beating Texas in the opener and Cal topping Pac-10 rival Southern California in the second.

Blair Brown had 12 kills, Deja McClendon 11 and Ariel Scott 10 in Penn State's 25-13, 25-13, 25-22 victory. Cal won 25-14, 25-17, 25-20, with All-American Tarah Murrey pounding 23 kills.

This is the matchup Cal has wanted all along. Penn State beat the Bears in the regionals the past three years.

"We want revenge, obviously," Cal All-America setter Carli Lloyd said. "When we saw the brackets, we knew when we did meet them it would be in the finals. I'm real, real excited to match up with them again Saturday night."

Penn State came back from a two-set deficit to beat Texas in last year's national championship match. This time, the Nittany Lions opened big leads in the first two sets and then used powerful kills by Brown and Scott to finish off the Longhorns (27-6) in the third.

"It's a great feeling, but we're not celebrating yet," Penn State defensive specialist Alyssa D'Errico said. "We have one more match to play. Our goals are the same, the program's goals are the same. It's about tradition and upholding that tradition and getting to a final is not our goal. Our goal is to win."

Juliann Faucette, the Big 12 player of the year and a two-time All-American, had 14 kills to lead Texas, which hit just .131 and lost for the first time in 20 matches.

"We just didn't feel like we ever got a rhythm on the serve-receive and serving, and when we give up almost 50 percent errors to a team of that quality, it's going to be very difficult to compete with them," Texas coach Jerritt Elliott said.

Texas was held to 48 points, a record for fewest points allowed in a three-set match in the rally-scoring era at the final four. The Longhorns' hitting percentage was their lowest in 24 matches.

Penn State hit .365 and won for the 18th time in 19 matches.

McClendon, the national freshman of the year, led a powerful offensive performance. A number of her kills went right down the line, and she hit a gaudy .733 while committing no errors on 15 swings.

"I felt she was phenomenal," said setter Kristin Carpenter, who had 38 assists. "That number is awesome. She put down everything I put up to her. She was pretty dominant."

Brown, the Big Ten player of the year and a two-time first-team All-American, added 10 digs.

Penn State, which scored 10 of the first 11 points, committed one error on its first 27 swings and hit .556 in the opening set. The Longhorns, who won consecutive points just once in the opener, used a 5-1 run to tie the second at 7. But Penn State won 12 of the next 15 to win going away.

The Nittany Lions limited the impact of All-American Rachael Adams, who was held to four kills.

Adams, who came into the match hitting a nation-leading .448, hit .231 on 13 swings. Doris, second nationally at .435, hit .091.

The Lions were undefeated in 2008 and '09. Though they looked every bit as dominant against Texas as they did in past years at the final four, they were a work in progress all season. They played five freshmen, had their winning streak snapped at 109 by Stanford in September and opened 3-3 in Big Ten play.

Now, here they are again, back in national championship match.

"There were times during the season we were exposed, and there were matches that gave us more information on what we could do to be better," coach Russ Rose said. "The success the players have had give them confidence in this environment."

Cal led 11-2 and 20-9 before Murrey's kill finished the first set. USC kept it close early in the second set, then Murrey slammed kills to win five of six points that produced an 8-4 lead, and she scored three of four points in a run that made it 21-14. Murrey broke open a close third set, and the Bears finished the match after a couple attack errors by USC's Falyn Fonoimoana.

Murrey hit .413 and added 14 digs, and Lloyd had 39 set assists. The Bears swept USC after losing two regular-season matches to the Women of Troy.

Lloyd said the goal was to sweep USC.

"We wanted it bad," she said. "We've been beaten twice by them. We weren't going to let it happen a third time."

USC (29-5), which upset Stanford in a five-set regional final, hit just .107.

"Funny how in seven days you can go from being on top of the world to the bottom of the heap with your feelings," USC coach Mick Haley said.

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