Russ Rose Then (2007):

Russ Rose Now (2025):

2007 Season: AVCA Second Team All-America … NCAA Championship All-Tournament Team … AVCA First Team All-Mideast Region … First Team All-Big Ten … Sports Imports/AVCA National and Big Ten Player of the Week (11/19) … started 35 of 36 matches and played in 114 of 122 games … directed the Penn State offense to a nation-leading .350 hitting percentage … under her guidance, the Lions shattered the NCAA Tournament record for team hitting percentage (besting the previous mark of .369 set by the 1995 Long Beach State team), attacking at a combined .424 clip while averaging 16.75 kills per game through six matches … in her two years at the helm of the Penn State offense, the Nittany Lions are attacking at a combined .336 clip with an average of 16.94 kills per game … had two attackers ranked in the top five in the nation in hitting percentage (Christa Harmotto, second, .492; Arielle Wilson, fifth, .446) … led the team, ranked fourth in the Big Ten and 24th in the country with an average of 13.02 assists per game … dished out 1,484 total assists, a mark that ties her for 10th on the single-season record list with Sam Tortorello in 2005 … ends her sophomore season with 2,897 career assists, good for sixth on the all-time career assists chart, while her career 12.76 assists per game average places her second all-time behind Tortorello … recorded 60 or more assists on five occasions, including a career-high 69 in the five game loss to Stanford at the Yale Classic (9/15) … produced 91 kills for the season, including a season-high seven on .400 hitting in the national championship match against Stanford (12/15) … had at least one kill in 32 matches … ranked fourth on the team in digs with 198 for an average of 1.74 digs per game … set a new personal best with 16 digs against Stanford (9/15) … had five double-digit dig matches … tallied 108 total blocks to sit fourth on the squad, the highest total by a non-middle attacker … recorded a career high 14 stuffs at Illinois (10/19), a mark that set a new five-game rally-scoring-era record and fell just one block shy of the all-time five-game match record of 15 set by middle hitter Robyn Goukas at Michigan on Oct. 7, 2000 … had 26 multiple-block matches … also tallied 12 service aces.

Before Penn State: Four-year letterwinner at Leland (Mich.) High School … Michigan Gatorade Player of the Year … led her squad to the 2006 Class D state championship, producing a single-match record of 48 kills in the title match … named Miss Volleyball for the state of Michigan in 2006 … four-time first team all-state, all-region dream team and all-conference … is the National and State High School record holder in season aces (296), career aces (937) and career kills (3,584) … during scholastic career attacked at a .440 clip while also contributing 1,816 digs and 680 blocks … ranked sixth on PrepVolleyball.com’s ‘Senior Aces’ list … was a member of the 2005 US Youth National A2 Team and played on the USA Red squad that won the gold medal at the HP Championships in Austin, Texas, where she also received the ‘Best Setter’ award … started on the 2004 USA Youth National Team that won the gold medal in Puerto Rico at the NORCECA Games, where she was recognized as ‘Best Server’ … a complete athlete, was also named first team all-state as a basketball player as a junior and senior … was voted one of the top 25 players in the state by the Detroit Free Press … member of the National Honor Society with a 3.7 grade point average.