Pickin' Nits Has Returned

What's up guys? Pickin' Nits has returned after a long offseason in which I got married, had three kids, bought some shit, moved to Turkey and converted to Islam (NOTE: none of those things happened).

Things are a little different this year. This is only running once a week during football season, it's running on Wednesdays and I have no plans to troll everyone that hates the word "Nits" this year. AT LEAST I HAVE NO PLANS ON DOING THAT THIS YEAR AT THE MOMENT. MUWAHAHAHAHAHAHA. But seriously, let's not have that happen again.

Your soundtrack this week is Cult of Personalty by Living Colour. Quick programming note before we start, you should read this awesome piece on the lax bros. Now. Let's do this.

Women's Soccer

• Since this is my column and I get the final say over all things that go in here -- ok, I don't, but still -- 14th ranked women's soccer goes first. The downside is that they've had four matches so far this year, so my two choices are to either recap all of them and hope I don't sound too repetitive, or just give brief recaps of everything. It was a long summer. Let's do the second one.
• The team kicked off the season with a 2-2 tie against West Virginia in which they scored two goals in the final ten minutes of regulation. They then beat Hofstra, 2-1, lost to Virginia, 5-1, and beat LaSalle (which is French for "The Salle"), 5-1. Overall, the team is 2-1-1
• Maya Hayes has been a freak so far. The U.S. international has five goals and two assists on the season, which are first and tied for first on the team, respectively.
• The Week Ahead: The team plays Boston University on the 6th before three away fixtures: Bucknell on the 10th, Oklahoma State on the 13th and Tulsa on the 15th. They'll probably have more matches than that by the time Pickin' Nits returns, but I would be forced to do work to figure that out, and lol.

Men's Soccer

• Penn State's y-chromosome bearing soccer team has only played twice thus far this season, both 1-0 wins over Radford and Central Connecticut. Both goals came in the second half of action.
• The only Nittany Lions to find the back of the net so far are Eli Dennis and Mark Wadid. GK Andrew Wolverton, who is also a U.S. International, has been a wall in net despite being largely untested.
• The Week Ahead: Matches at Rutgers and St. John's on the 6th and 8th, respectively, are this weekend, before matches at home against Cal and Robert Morris on the 13th and 17th. Fun story: St. John's is in Queens, and I went to Queens on accident over the summer (remember, kids -- ALWAYS make sure you're going on the correct NYC subway). It was terrifying.

Field Hockey

• 6th ranked field hockey has only played twice so far this year: at Old Dominion and at Virginia. The team is 1-1, with a 3-1 win over ODU and a 4-2 loss to UVA.
• Only three Lions have scored goals so far this year -- Taylor Herold (2), Brittany Grzywacz (2) and Ashtin Klingler (1). Laura Gebhart has four of the team's five assists. Oh, and Herold has only played in 75 of a possible 140 minutes. This week's #HOTSPROTZTAEK is that she is good at scoring field hockey goal scoring units.
• The Week Ahead: The team kicks off their home schedule with matches on the 6th against Temple and the 8th against Connecticut. Then, they leave to play at Lock Hacken on the 11th and at Princeton on the 15th. Lock Haven is apparently D-1 in field hockey. Go figure.

Women's Volleyball

• The human death machines that are the top ranked women's volleyball team will always close Pickin' Nits, because I am a firm believe that you save the best for last. Also: I clicked on them last when I pulled up everyone's schedules, so I'm just now realizing that I wrote about other teams before women's volleyball. #FiurBill
• I usually don't talk about exhibitions, but we're starting there with women's volleyball: the team kicked off their season by sweeping the Polish National Team, 3-0. Which is awesome. Ok, real stuff.
• A scant two matches for thine women of spikes and shorts, both were a part of the Penn State Invitational. The Nittany Lions didn't drop a set to either of their opponents: Syracuse or Louisville. The team beat Syracuse, 3-0 (25-16, 25-15, 25-17), then rolled over Louisville, 3-0 (25-15, 25-16, 25-13). These wins, coupled with a loss to Hawaii by #1 Texas, propelled the Nittany Lions to the top spot in the most recent AVCA Coaches Poll.
• While Ariel Scott may be the best volleyball player in the country, she didn't lead the team in kills this week. Her 22 kills were second to redshirt freshman Paulina Prieto Cerame's 27. Sure. Why not give Russ Rose another monster outside hitter? Also: Micha Hancock had nine aces. Eight of them came against Louisville. She actually killed a redshirt sophomore setter for the Cardinal with her serve, because Micha Hancock's serve is the most terrifying thing on the planet.
• The Week Ahead: The team has two tournaments. The first one is going to be insane: the Nike Volleyball Big Four Tournament, where they will play Texas and Florida in Austin. The second one is in Dunk City, where they will take on Marquette, Central Arkansas and Florida Gulf Coast. One is more challenging with the other. If you can guess which one, you'll win the old bottle of steak sauce I found in my fridge when I moved into my new place a few weeks ago.

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