When Penn State earned the commitment from right-side hitter Kennedy Martin in the transfer portal there was a lot of hype around it. She’s lived up to those expectations and has been the Nittany Lions’ best attacker this season.
Martin has had over 25 kills in three of the last four matches. The right-side hitter earned a career high in kills today against UCLA with 34.
“I feel like the setter just put me in really good spots, and then the non-setters too, like I feel like I could see what was in front of me pretty well,” Martin said. “I felt like I was still put in a good spot where I could try to do something else.”
Her previous career high was 33 kills against No. 3-seed Kansas in the 2024 NCAA Tournament Second Round, carrying Florida to an upset victory.
Setter Addie Lyon has built chemistry with Martin as she has taken the starting role. In this matchup, Martin was set 67 times and had a .403 hitting percentage.
“Me and Addie have been working really hard in practice to just figure out my angle of approach and location of the ball,” Martin said.
In the game against USC, Martin put the team on her back and scored the final eight points of the fifth set, totaling six kills and two blocks in that span.
“Kennedy has a really good mindset when it comes to blocking and attacking the ball. Every day she’s in practice getting better, working with our coaches, working with the people next to her, and I think it’s only going to get better from here,” middle blocker Maggie Mendelson said. She’s shown that she’s super coachable and just a great teammate all around.
In the fourth and final set of the match, Martin had 15 kills.
“I can kind of just launch it up there, and she jumps so high and she’s so big, so that kind of gives me a little breath of fresh air just so that I know that she’s always ready and she’s always working hard to get off the net so she’s available,” libero Gillian Grimes said.
The Florida transfer was the majority of the Nittany Lion offense, holding more than half of the team’s total kills of 62. Emmi Sellman had the second most kills with 11, and was the only other hitter with double-digit kills.
“We needed to keep mixing it up a little bit, and we need to get our left side scoring a bit more,” coach Katie Schumacher-Cawley said.
The Fort Mill, South Carolina, native has carried the offense for the majority of the season and is starting to see an increase in her numbers because of it.
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