Friday, November 4, 2005
Swim team
By Kelly Houghton
staff writer
kihsooo@psu.edu
With the leaves in an array
of bright colors and the bliz
zards of Eric County creeping
near, winter sport athletes are
preparing for their opening
days of competition. In fact,
the usual water polo matches
that have been drawing crowds
to the Junker Center through
out the first half of the semes
ter will be replaced with a new
form of battle. The indoor
waters will now be occupied
by your men's and women's
swim teams.
In fact, this weekend marks
the beginning of Behrend's
season under third year head
coach Jen Wallace. Not only
did the men's and women's
swim teams win four dual
meets last winter, they also
demolished 22 school records
Coach Wallace once again is
expecting to accomplish
impressive feats this season
"Once again, we expect to see
numerous team records broken
and a handful of ECAC quali
fiers," said Wallace.
This Friday, Nov. 4, your
blue and white will travel to
Buffalo State to open their sea
son. But that isn't the only
swimming action in store for
the weekend. On Saturday, at
11 a.m., Penn State Erie and
the Junker Center will host the
"Blue & White" swim meet.
On the women's side, a tal
ented group of sophomore
swimmers are expected to lead
the team. Last year, as vigor
ous freshmen, Melissa
Pilewski, Ashlee Marchand
Head Coach Joe Paterno eagerly looks
against a Big Ten foe. Paterno and his
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• P
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makes splash on opening weekend
The swimming season starts this week with high expectations and
strong performers. Look forward to record-breakers this season.
and Cyndi Morales became the
first Behrend women to quali
fy for the ECAC
Championships.
Sophomore standout Melissa
Pilewski, recently commented
on the small size of the
women's squad, which fielded
a roster of only 10 swimmers.
However, she believes that
they can pull through to make
"big things happen." Big
things may possibly transpire
from the five new faces that
have been added to the roster.
"The incoming freshmen look
good," said Pilewski.
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on as his Penn State football team embarks on a weekly battle
squad look to capture this year's Big Ten championship.
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The women's team also
gained strength in the depth of
swimmers spe-
cializing in cer
tain events.
Freshman Annie
Harris is a tal-
ented sprinter
junior Leah
Haller is a disci
plined distance
swimmer and
freshman Erin
Emrich adds power as an IMR
competitor. a series that com
bines all four strokes.
Profound talent. discipline and
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Men's soccer season comes to end
By Heidi Weismiller
staff writer
hmwso26qpsu.cdu
The Behrend men's soccer team ended their
season in a loss to Frostburg State. The Lions,
ranked number four in the conference, played at
home on Saturday, Oct. 29, against the number
five seed, Frostburg State.
The game was very evenly matched and the
win could have gone either way. The Lion's
Justin Reese had the first goal of the game,
Behrend's only goal. He scored with about 10
minutes left in the first half. The game seemed
to be going in favor of the lions until the last 15
minutes of the game. Frostburg put in a goal to
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"Once again, we
expect to see
numerous team
records broken."
- Coach Jen Wallac
CONTRIBUTED PHOTO
power may all be the Lady
Lions need to send more
swimmers to the ECACs this
year, a goal that Pilewski said
the team would like to
achieve.
In regards to the men's
team. they should have minor
difficulties getting used to the
water, since the team is pri
marily composed of talented
water polo brutes. Senior
Steve Schleicher, a distance
swimmer, will lead the team
as captain this season. Junior
Brandon Thiel will also he
looked upon for his leadership
in directing the team of under
classman. However, this par
ticular group of underclass
man should not to he taken
less seriously; in fact, they're
the weapons that should ulti
mately he feared.
Sophomores
Rodolphe Acelor, Vincent
Brewer and Anthony Spoto,
all water polo standouts, will
reunite for the 05/06 season
with Dustin Fairchild and
Matthew Seiferth; forming the
"five sensational sopho-
Behrend will essentially be
on the road for the majority of
the season, host-
ing only four
home meets.
Be sure not
to miss the action
when the Lions
are in town. Your
next chance to
support the swim
team will be on
November 18th,
at 6:00 pm; as they prepare to
surpass Nazareth University.
Penn State football continues to win
By Matt Davidson
contributing writer
nirdso24o,psiLedu
Penn State football, what can I say? Just when
all was lost we get a super senior along with some
super freshman to boost our roster and take us to
the number one spot in the Big Ten.
Northwestern check, Minnesota check, Ohio
State check, Michigan...well let's get this out of
the way. If we couldn't keep them from getting
into the end zone from 50 yards away in less than
40 seconds, then we didn't deserve to win the
football game. It doesn't matter whether the two
seconds was fair or not, the fact is if our defense
was so good, and if they wanted to win, then we
should've stopped them.
The last time Penn State was this awesome, or
even ranked for the matter, was 1999 when we
had the talents of Lavar Arrington and Courtney
Brown on the team. Keep in mind these two were
gone the next year. This team's offense is cen
tered on four -that's right four - freshman wide
outs that have all consistently played at a level
higher than any Penn State receiver I've seen. The
only Penn State receiver that was drafted I can
remember Bryant Johnson, and he's somewhere
around third or fourth on the depth chart of the
Arizona Cardinals and he in no way produced like
any of these players.
An even more important factor is our rushing
game. The amazing thing is that 10 of 21 of our
rushing touchdowns have come from our quarter
back, Tony Hunt. He leads in yards on the team
with 807, compared to other running backs
around the league may be modest, but considering
he averages 6.2 yards per carry puts him among
the elite of any runningback in college football or
football in general. Some credit has to be given
to the offensive line - actually a lot of credit has
tie the score. Despite the persistent efforts of
Behrend to pull ahead, Frostburg scored again
with less than a minute to go in the game.
Immediately following the goal, Behrend
player Rob Milani received a red card and
was ejected.
Both teams took a fair amount of shots and
both goalies played well. Behrend took a total
of 13 shots and Behrend's goalie, Matt
Zirnsak had seven saves
This disappointing 2-1 loss for Behrend
ended their season. Frostburg will continue in
the conference playoffs but for the Lions, the
season is over.
Collegiate Crash Course:
Women's Volleyball 101
By Matt Davidson
contributing writer
11 -0 ( 15024W
Bump, set, spike. These are
some terms you associate with
volleyball. It doesn't matter
who you're playing with I'm:le
Leroy at the family reunion.
Stacy from high school gym
class, or the little kids at the
park who always end up catch
ing the ball. When the girls of
the Penn State Behrend Lions
use these terms they take them
to an entirely different degree.
If you ever thought that volley
ball was a monotonous hack
and forth of an over siied
ping-pong hall. then you'ic
wrong and you should watch
these girls play.
Bump or pass is a preLision
maneuver that takes years id
practice to perfect. Take it
from someone who tried. I
played volleyball in high
school for two years and
frankly I couldn't cut it
because I couldn't bump. I
could spike and set. but what
looks like the most basic of the
volleyball formula happens to
he the most important. Maybe
it's just because I used to play.
but believe me these girls
deserve a lot of credit. A hall
that's spiked at a blurring
speed would make an one of
us run for cover, hut those on
the defense find a way to posi
tion their forearms directly
underneath the ball in order to
position at the same spot on
the net time after time after
time. I challenge anyone who
takes the sport of vollcyhall fol
granted to try and do this and
to he gi \en to the offensi e line. There arc only
three players on the team that haven't gotten at
least four yards per carry. Seeing as though you
only need three yards on every carry to guarantee
a touchdown on a drive that's pretty good.
Now the defense. excluding the Michigan
game. is the best in college football as far as I'm
concerned. Now, I also said that Penn State was
the best defense in college football last year, but
this year the offense occasionally gives them a
break by keeping them off the field. This seems to
have made all the difference for players such as
Paul Poslusinv, Calvin Lowry, Dan Connor,
Tamba Hali. Alan Zamaitis. and Scott Paxson
Poslustn) has been particularly effective being
nominated to the semifinals for Munger,
Bednarik, and Butkus ax‘ards. I expect to see
another NFL draft record for Penn State players in
the future on what looks like defense alone.
Some people may sa "What about Penn State's
future'?' Michael Robinson is already a super sen
ior and he is oh\ iousb, a critical part of this
offense. Well, Anthony Morelli was the number
two recruit in the nation going into the 2004 sea
son and he might not he too had. We can't expect
him to he able to get 10 rushing touchdowns, but
once these freshmen receivers arc more disci-
Alined I expect to see the kind of West Coast
offense that Penn State has never had. There is a
reason why Morelli was put in to throw some
Hail Marys during his freshman season.
I have a question for those of you who had the
nerve to doubt Joe Paterno...how does it feel to
be wrong? Some of you skeptics even say that
he's no longer running the team. Well, any way
you look at it. he's either calling the shots himself
or he's delegating to the people who are calling
the shots. This season is evidence of why Paterno
is "the winningest coach" in college football his
tory.
Senior defender Dan Bash boots the ball downfield
The Behrend Beacon I
do it with any sort of consis-
Setting is where the offense
begins. This job is delegated to
the hest of a very talented
glom) of individuals. This per
son responds to the signal the
hitter sends to any number of
dozens of possible sets. These
sets can arch forward, arch
hackward, short• and in the
middle. high in the middle
hurt and haekwards, and who
knows what eke the team has
up their sleeve. But these set
ters have to he able to set the
hall on a dime at any time dur-
ing the game.
Spiking. then. is left, the
glor ,tat. Nothing is more
gratiking to a front row player
than slamming that hall as hard
as von can at the face of an
opponent. Yes. sometimes they
hit their mark and yes. it's
almost always funny when it
happens. The timing and syn
chronitation between the setter
and hitter has to be perfectly
timed in order for the play to
he successful. Sure it helps to
he able to
. jump high. but if
you aren't disciplined enough
to get the timing done then you
will he watching someone who
can from the bench.
Bottom line is the sport of
volleyball is one to be reck-
oned with. Sure, it gets a bad
rap from family reunions all
over the country, but just go
see our girls play one of these
days and they will personally
show you what you have been
missing. Bump, set, spike will
never mean the same thing to
VOL.! a 2aln