Though the Penn State women's volleyball team is still feeling the stings from Wednesday night's loss to Ohio State, a match which they were a point away from winning in four games, the Nittany Lions have little time to think about what went wrong.

The 8-2 Lions will host Purdue Saturday at 7 p.m. at Rec Hall. Though the Boilermakers haven't defeated the Lions since 1987, Penn State woman's volleyball coach Russ Rose is fully aware that his team can not afford to be stuck thinking about their last game when playing a Big Ten team.

"Last season we played Purdue in our last regular season Big Ten game, and we were losing two out of three games," Rose said. "We know everyone in the Big Ten can beat us, and with the rally score, every team is susceptible to losing. You don't really know what's going to happen in any game."

Purdue has struggled mightily so far this year. The Boilermakers are 1-7 overall coming into the weekend, but their only victory was in the Big Ten against Iowa.

Purdue coach Jeff Hulsmeyer's squad is young, with only three seniors and one junior. The Boilermakers have gotten impressive performance from their younger players however. Freshmen Leah Wiscmeier and Lindsay Phillips won starting jobs at outside hitter and middle blocker respectively, and rank second and third on the team in kills with 2.62 and 2.15 respectively. The team leader is senior Maegan Peterson with 2.84.

"I'm excited to see the successes of our younger players," Hulsmeyer said. "And I'm excited for the future of the program because of the quality players we're bringing in, but I'm a little concerned by the fact that freshmen are winning starting spots."

The youthful team is facing a fearsome challenge this weekend. They will stop in Columbus to play undefeated Ohio State before coming to Rec Hall.

The Lions will be trying to take some lessons from their Columbus visit. They started extremely slow, allowing the Buckeyes to run off ten points before finally scoring. After solid performances in games two and three and most of game four, the Lions failed to close the Buckeyes out and eventually lost in five games.

"I was disappointed that we were unable to win the match when we had the opportunity to win, but yet I feel pretty good that we were in that position against a very good opponent," Rose said. "There were times when we played well, but I'm disappointed that we couldn't sustain that throughout the game."

Along with getting his team to play a more consistent game, Rose hopes to get Schumacher more help offensively. The senior outside hitter leads the team with 4.84 kills per game. No other player on the squad averages more than 2.96 per game.

The Lions know they will never have time for a letdown with Big Ten matches every weekend from here on out, and that Saturday's game will be no exception.

"I don't think we can take anyone for granted," Schumacher said. "Regardless of our situation, we have to be ready for Purdue."