READING, PA - The Penn State Berks women's volleyball team rallied from an early deficit, only to end up suffering a 3-2 hardship to Wilkes University in a non-conference contest on Thursday night at the Beaver Community Center.

The Nittany Lions (5-14) had a late lead slip a way in a 25-22 first set loss and then the Colonels claimed a convincing 25-16 win in the second to jump out to a 2-0 lead in the series. Berks took an early lead and held on for a 25-20 win in the third set and evened the match at 2-all with a hard-fought, gritty 25-22 win in the fourth.

The decisive fifth set had a lot of excitement and was a back-and-forth battle, with neither team holding more than a two-point lead throughout. The Colonels went ahead for the first time in the set at 8-7 and eventually were up 10-8. The Nittany Lions tied it up at 10-all and then each team exchanged service errors to make it 11-all. Madison Hetrick recorded a kill to give Berks a 12-11 lead, but Wilkes tallied the next three points to go up 14-12. Abbie Carr notched a kill to make it 14-13, but Jamey Mikovich registered her 28th kill of the contest to put the game away with a 15-13 triumph in the fifth.

Jenna Plitnick led the Nittany Lions in kills for the third straight game as she enjoyed her finest all around performance of the season. The sophomore outside hitter recorded career-highs in kills (10), digs (14), attack percentage (.171), and total blocks (4), while matching her season best in block assists (3).

Carr chipped in nine kills, four block assists, two aces, and two solo blocks, while Maddy Kessler added seven kills and three blocks assists. Megan Lackman and Abbie Tuel both tallied four kills, with Tuel also matching her season-high with three block assists. MacKenzie Reed handed out her third highest total of assists in a game with 36.

Defensively, the Nittany Lions racked up a season-high 86 digs as four members finished in double-digits. Madison Wojciechowski collected a season-high 30 digs, followed by Plitnick with 14. Ashley Morris and Hetrick each had 12 digs, which were a season-best for Hetrick. Reed also turned in a strong defensive effort with nine digs.

The Nittany Lions will look to bounce back with a pair of NEAC contests on Saturday, October 6 at Penn College. They will face SUNY Cobleskill at 1 p.m., followed by SUNY Poly at 3 p.m.