Volleyball Faces Challenging Three-Match Road Stretch

Youngstown State at Wright State, NKU and Oakland
Match 1	Friday, Oct. 14 \| 6 p.m. \| Dayton, Ohio
Opponent & Coverage	at Wright State - ESPN+ \| Live Stats
Match 2	Saturday, Oct. 15 \| 4 p.m. \| Highland Heights, Ky.
Opponent & Coverage	vs. IUPUI - ESPN+ \| Live Stats
Match 3	Tuesday, Oct. 18 \| 6 p.m. \| Rochester, Mich.
Opponent & Coverage	at Oakland - Live Stats
Live Tweets	@YSUVolleyball
Hash Tags	#GoGuins \| #HLVB
Mobile App	iOS Download \| Android Download

The Youngstown State volleyball team will begin a road-heavy phase of its Horizon League schedule this weekend as it travels southwest to take on Wright State and Northern Kentucky. The matches against the Raiders and Norse will be followed by a midweek contest at Oakland, and YSU will play seven of its next nine matches overall away from Beeghly Center.

The Penguins and Raiders will play at 6 p.m. on Friday, and the match at NKU will be Saturday at 4 p.m. Both of those affairs will be streamed live on ESPN+, and Tuesday's match at Oakland will be at 6 p.m. Live stats will be available for all three contests through links on YSUsports.com.

All three upcoming matches are against teams above Youngstown State in the conference standings. Wright State is unbeaten in league play at 7-0, and the Raiders have won 10 straight decisions going back to Sept. 15. NKU is 5-2 against the conference and sitting third in the league standings, and Oakland is 3-4 with a win earlier this season against YSU. Saturday's match against the Norse will conclude the first loop of conference play for the Penguins.

Recapping Last Week

YSU vs. Robert Morris on Friday, Oct. 7: W, 3-2 | 25-22, 25-17, 24-26, 20-25, 15-9 | Recap | Box Score

Youngstown State won its lone match on last week's schedule by outlasting Robert Morris in five sets. The Penguins won the first two sets to take a 2-0 lead in the match, and they held on after RMU won the next two to force a tiebreaker.
Sophomore outside hitter Paula Gursching broke the school record for kills in a match with 33, a total that hadn't been achieved by any Horizon League player in seven years. She added 20 digs for the first 30-kill, 20-dig performance in school history and just the second by any Division I player in the country this season. Gursching had nine kills in the third set and 10 in the fourth.
Gursching added three aces and a block assist to bring her point total to 36.5, which was also a school record.
Freshman middle blocker Julia Sell had 10 blocks, which is the most by a YSU player since 2016 and the most in school history by a freshman.
Senior Josi Borum registered her Division I-leading sixth triple-double of the campaign with 12 kills, 25 assists and 11 digs, and she added a career-best eight blocks. Borum has seven triple-doubles as a Penguin and 11 overall in her Division I career, which began at Chicago State.
Five Penguins had at least 10 digs in the match. Joining Gursching (20) and Borum (11) were Isabel Schaefbauer (11), Elise Moeller (11) and Isidora Sisic (10).
Robert Morris came into the match averaging a league-high 1.83 aces per set, but the Penguins were strong in serve receive and allowed just seven aces in the five-set affair. Youngstown State had eight aces of its own, and Gursching and Moeller led the way with three apiece.

News & Notes

Youngstown State had a very hectic start to the Horizon League season with six matches in the first 12 days of the conference slate, but it will enter Friday's Wright State match having played just one match in the previous 12 days.
At 8-10 overall and 2-5 in league play, YSU has two more wins overall than it had in 2021, and it needs one more Horizon League victory to match its conference win total from last season. The Penguins were 6-23 overall and 3-15 against the league in 2021.
In addition to surpassing last year's win total, the Penguins have now won 35 sets in their first 18 matches, which is three more than they won in 29 matches in 2021. In the first 21 matches of last season, the Penguins were swept 12 times and won 19 sets. Over the last 26 matches - the final eight of 2021 and the first 18 of 2022 - YSU has been swept three times and won 48 sets.
The Penguins are more than halfway through their regular-season schedule, and some of the statistical comparisons to 2021 are noteworthy. YSU is hitting .229 as a team this season, which is a big jump from last year's mark of .181. The Penguins haven't hit at least .200 over a full season since 2014, and they haven't hit better than .218 since 1999. In turn, YSU is averaging 1.02 more kills and 0.92 more assists per set. Defensively, YSU has held opponents to a .194 attack percentage after allowing them to hit .257 in 2021. YSU is averaging 0.5 more blocks per set.
YSU ranks second in the Horizon League with a .229 attack percentage, and its 12.30 kills per set is the fourth-best mark in the conference. Defensively, YSU allows the fewest kills per set in the conference at 11.72.
Paula Gursching has reached the 20-kill plateau in five straight matches and nine times in her last 10 contests. Only one other player has had two 30-kill matches in a YSU career, and Gursching has reached 30 twice in her last three contests.
Gursching won her fourth Horizon League Player of the Week award of the season on Wednesday. She now has six weekly honors in her career, which is a school record. Only two other Penguins have been a three-time Horizon League Player of the Week in their careers, and Gursching has matched that in the first seven weeks of the 2022 season. Only five players in conference history have earned the weekly award more than Gursching.
Gursching has 771 kills in her career, which is more than any other Penguin has had through the end of a sophomore season. The previous mark was 724 by Ruth Boscaljon.
Since the start of Horizon League play, Gursching is averaging 5.47 kills per set on a .332 attack percentage from the outside hitter position. Milwaukee's Ari Miller ranks second in kills per set at 3.81, which is 1.66 fewer than Gursching.
Through matches completed on Oct. 11, Gursching ranks third in the country with 341 total kills, and she's fourth with 389.0 total points. In terms of per-set averages, Gursching ranks seventh in points per set (5.56) and eighth in kills per set (4.87).
Josi Borum continues to lead all Division I players in the country this season with six triple-doubles. She has had seven six triple-doubles in her Youngstown State career, and she had four as a freshman at Chicago State. Her 11 career triple-doubles are the second-most among all active Division I players behind Sacred Heart's Sarah Ciszek's total of 20.
Borum needs five kills to reach 750 for her career. She reached 800 career digs in Friday's match against Robert Morris.
Julia Sell has started the last three matches at middle blocker, and she is averaging 1.31 blocks per set as a starter.
Isabel Schaefbauer tied her season high with 29 assists in the win over Robert Morris, and she has 723 assists in her collegiate career.

Scouting the Opponents

Wright State

Wright State has won its last 10 matches, and it has won 18 straight sets after dropping the first set at Oakland on Sept. 24. The Raiders are 15-3 overall and 7-0 in Horizon League play heading into Thursday's match against Robert Morris.
Wright State leads the league offensively with 13.26 kills and 12.70 assists per set, and the Raiders are also tops on the defensive side with 17.41 digs per set. That strong back-row play also translates to a league-low 0.70 aces per set by opponents.
The Raiders have a balanced attack on offense as four players average between Megan Alders' 2.34 and Sam Ott's 2.94 kills per set. Lainey Stephenson leads the conference with 10.74 assists per set, and Jenna Story is pacing the league with 5.46 digs per set.

Northern Kentucky

Northern Kentucky was the preseason favorite to win the Horizon League, and the Norse are 7-11 overall and 5-2 in conference play. The Norse faced a challenging non-conference slate that resulted in a 2-9 start, but NKU's only losses since have been to the teams above it in the standings, Wright State and Green Bay.
Since the start of Horizon League play, NKU is averaging a conference-best 3.07 blocks per set while also ranking among the top two in kills, assists, opponent hitting percentage and opponent kills.
Reilly Briggs leads the Norse with 3.17 kills per set overall and 3.52 per set in league play. Her yearly average ranks eighth in the conference. Allie Siefke is the top blocker in the league at 1.25 per set.

Oakland

Heading into the weekend, Oakland is 7-12 overall and 3-4 in Horizon League play, and the Golden Grizzlies will play IUPUI and Purdue Fort Wayne before YSU comes to town on Tuesday. Oakland had an impressive five-set win at Green Bay on Oct. 7, and its other league wins have come at Robert Morris and at YSU.
When the Penguins and Golden Grizzlies played at Beeghly Center on Sept. 27, Youngstown State stormed out to a 25-10 opening-set win but dropped the next three 25-16, 25-23, 25-20. The Penguins hit .239 in the match and got double-digit kill totals from Paula Gursching (20), Josi Borum (13) and Abbie Householder (11). Borum had a triple-double of 13 kills, 18 assists and 18 digs.
Patti Cesarini ranks second in the Horizon League with 3.65 kills per set, and Emily Wichmann is averaging 5.14 digs per set to rank second in the circuit.

Up Next

Following Tuesday's match at Oakland, Youngstown State will return home to host the Horizon League's Wisconsin teams on Oct. 21-22. The Penguins will take on Green Bay on Oct. 21 at 6 p.m., and they'll welcome Milwaukee on Oct. 22 at 4 p.m.