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Penn State Sports
The women's soccer team is in the midst of a memorable run in the postseason. The team will play in the College Cup semifinals in North Carolina on Friday. Rutgers will be the opponent, a team that the ladies defeated 2-0 just 20 days ago at Jeffrey Field. The first time the two teams met this year was a different story – Penn State lost Rutgers on the road on Oct. 18, 1-0. Three Penn State players were named to TopDrawerSoccer's Team of the Week following a great performance versus West Virginia last week. Here's the homepage for the tournament.
The women's volleyball team will play Howard on Friday night at 7:30 p.m. in University Park. A free live stream of the match will be available via gopsusports.com. The team is coming off a win versus Northwestern and a regular season finale loss to Nebraska. Two of the team's five losses this season have come at the hands of the Cornhuskers. If the Lions win on Friday, they will play Saturday in State College at 7:30 p.m. versus the winner of the Villanova and Dayton match.
The football team will wait for the results of Saturday's championship games across the country before it finds out its bowl destination The bowl match-ups will be announced starting just after noon on Sunday. The experts are projecting either the TaxSlayer Bowl, Foster Farms Bowl, or the Music City Bowl as Penn State's destination. A day after the firing of John Donovan, Josh Moyer broke down some of the challenges facing the team. Former Lion quarterback Michael O'Connor is enjoying his year at the University of British Columbia. In his first year O'Connor led the Thunderbirds to a Vanier Cup victory.
The hockey team will begin B1G play this weekend when it hosts Michigan State for a pair of games. Both games will be available via BTN2go Plus. The team is currently ranked in the highest position in school history in the USCHO.com poll. The team is beginning to gel at just the right time, finishing November without taking a loss over the span of six games. The goalie tandem of Matt Skoff and Eamon McAdam have found a groove, finishing in the top five in save percentage nationally for the month of November. McAdam was awarded the Big Ten's first star this week for his performance versus Vermont which resulted in his first career shutout. Check out the highlights from the win on Sunday.
HIGHLIGHTS: See all four goals and some of McAdam's saves from yesterday's 4-0 win. https://t.co/ZFwPTroHs2 #HockeyValley
— Penn State Hockey (@PennStateMHKY) November 30, 2015
The wrestling team will host the Nittany Lion Open on Sunday starting at 10 a.m. Cael's group had the week off following a win versus Stanford on November 22.
Around The Big Ten
Iowa and Michigan State will play in the Big Ten championship game this Saturday in Lucas Oil Stadium. The winner will (presumably) move on to the NCAA football playoffs.
There are a few Big Ten teams that will be hiring a new head coach this offseason. One team that probably will not is Indiana, as the team secured its sixth win this weekend versus Purdue. The IndyStar took a look at some of the team's bowl prospects. Speaking of Purdue, the Boilermakers let their offensive and defensive coordinators go following the season in an attempt to spark new life in the program.
Following a tough loss in its final game with Northwestern, Illinois is left looking for answers. The Illini had a decent 5-7 showing considering their head coach was fired just before the start of the season. This led to the program removing the interim tag from interim head coach Bill Cubit and giving him a two-year extension, which was...weird. In fact, it led SBN's Illinois blog to declared that Illinois doesn't care about football. Keep your head up Illini, the Beckman stink should wear off in a couple of years.
Maryland had a satisfying win over Rutgers to end the season. The Terps will begin a search for a new head coach. Many high-profile names have been mentioned as possible candidates, but no rumors have been substantiated.
The Michigan football program rebounded nicely from the 5-7 result it had in 2014 and Brendan Quinn took a look at the numbers to identify the progress. Anthony Broome made a wishlist of things the Wolverines could improve next season.