Full speed ahead.

The No. 4 Penn State men's volleyball team rolls into Rec Hall tonight riding a 12-match winning streak. In what will likely be a warmup for next week's road trip to California, the Nittany Lions (12-2, 3-0 EIVA) are looking to cruise past EIVA opponents New York University and Springfield College.

The Lions face NYU at 7 tonight in the Main Gym of Rec Hall. They will take on Springfield at 4 p.m. tomorrow in Rec Hall's South Gym.

At this point in the season, Penn State has asserted itself as the best team on the East Coast. Against EIVA opponents, Penn State averages 15.8 kills per game at a 0.357 hitting average, 1.9 service aces per game, 9.6 digs per game and 4.8 blocks per game. NYU and Springfield will surely face a steep climb to victory.

Even though neither team has ever defeated the Lions, Penn State coach Mark Pavlik indicated that no opponent should be overlooked.

"We're making sure that our physical advantage over some of the EIVA teams still exists, while pointing an eye towards the future when there won't be much of an advantage at all," Pavlik said.

"I tell the guys, 'look, we have the advantage right now and that will pay off for us as long as we play hard without mistakes,' " he said. "If we cut down on our errors, then our physical play will force teams to play us at a very high level for the entire match."

However, the physical toughness with which Penn State has played all season seemed to take its toll after this past weekend's road trip.

"The guys have been working really hard for the past couple of weeks and we've been somewhat physically fatigued," Pavlik said. "I gave them Monday and Tuesday off because sometimes the best practice is no practice, just get them out of the gym to clear their minds and be regular college students for a couple of days. Then they will want to get back into the gym and get ready for the next big stretch of matches."

Not only will Penn State be fired up and ready, the Lions will have the National Player of the Week on their side for the second time this season.

For the second time in his career, senior co-captain Keith Kowal was named the Sports Imports/AVCA Division I-II men's volleyball National Player of the Week. He is hitting 0.433 and averaging 2.44 kills per game and 1.4 blocks per game. Kowal also needs only 11 more block assists to become Penn State's all-time block assists leader.

Freshman libero Gary Vogel will also look to continue his dominant play this weekend. Last weekend at the Golden Dome Classic, Vogel set the rally-scoring era record for digs in a match with 18. This season Vogel has produced six double-digit dig outings and is averaging a team-high 2.47 digs per game.