Box Score 1 |
Box Score 2 SPRINGFIELD, Mass. – After a day in which the No. 3 State University of New York at New Paltz men's volleyball team made history, the Hawks won twice on Saturday afternoon on the final day of the Springfield Invitational to claim the event's title. New Paltz beat Johnson & Wales University, 3-0 (25-23, 25-15, 25-17), before topping Bard College, 3-1 (21-25, 25-20, 25-20, 25-18).
The Hawks went 4-0 at the Springfield Invitational, which included a pair of straight-set wins on Friday against the top two ranked teams in NCAA Division III: No. 1 Rivier University and No. 2 Springfield College.
New Paltz, which has now won eight straight matches, rises to 15-1 overall and next hosts the Stevens Institute of Technology on Wednesday, Feb. 19, at 7 p.m. Johnson & Wales drops to 6-4 overall and next visits Anna Maria College on Tuesday, Feb. 18, at 7 p.m., while Bard drops to 3-11 overall and next hosts New York University on Tuesday, Feb. 18, at 7 p.m.
No. 3 New Paltz 3, Johnson & Wales 0 After a first set that saw the Hawks post just a .143 hitting percentage, New Paltz ended up bearing down in the final two sets of the match, finishing with a .273 mark. The Wildcats, meanwhile, were limited to just .026 hitting for the contest, and the Hawks held the upper hand in service aces (6-2) and total team blocks (8-6).
New Paltz controlled the first set early, but after the Hawks took a 17-13 edge off a Wildcat attacking error, Johnson & Wales scored five of the next six points to tie the score at 18-all. New Paltz scored the next two points before Johnson & Wales took its first lead of the match by rattling off three straight points, the last of which prompted a Hawk timeout. Four consecutive New Paltz points brought up set point at 24-21, but the Wildcats stayed alive, scoring off a kill and a Hawk attacking error to pull within one. Freshman middle blocker
Steven Woessner (Massapequa Park, N.Y./Massapequa) slammed down the set-ending kill on the next rally, though, and the Hawks won the first set, 25-23.
While the early portion of the second set was tightly contested, New Paltz swelled a 9-7 lead into an 18-8 advantage after scoring nine of 10 points during that span. That run ended up being insurmountable for the Wildcats, as the Hawks took a 25-15 triumph in the stanza.
Johnson & Wales started off strong in the third, hopping out to a 7-2 lead. New Paltz started slowly chipping away, and 10 straight Hawk points gave the team a 14-8 edge. The Wildcats only scored on consecutive rallies twice the remainder of the set, and a 25-17 triumph for the Hawks in the third gave them the match.
A total of 12 student-athletes took the floor for the Hawks, and sophomore middle blocker
Christopher Husmann (Massapequa, N.Y./Massapequa) led a balanced attack by slamming down eight kills. Junior setter
John Lutjen (Smithtown, N.Y./Smithtown West) and sophomore setter
Christian Smith (Massapequa, N.Y./Massapequa) dished out 19 and 12 assists, respectively, while senior libero
Victor Tuminelli (Dix Hills, N.Y./Half Hollow Hills West) came up with nine digs.
Christian Smith reinforced the front row on defense with four block assists.
For Johnson & Wales, senior outside hitter Shawn Kennedy ignited the offense with eight kills, while junior setter J.J. Bessette doled out 20 assists. Kennedy and sophomore middle blocker Kyle Eva paced the team defensively with six digs and four total blocks, respectively.
No. 3 New Paltz 3, Bard 1 In a rematch from Wednesday night's United Volleyball Conference (UVC) match in Bard's home gym, the Raptors handed the Hawks their lone set loss of the entire weekend. New Paltz hit .265 for the match, while Bard posted a solid .147 mark led by a .320 hitting clip in the first stanza. The Raptors held the upper hand in blocks (7.5-6), but the Hawks ended up owning a 7-4 advantage in service aces.
Unfazed by its nationally-ranked opponent, Bard played New Paltz tough early on in the first set, and the Raptors took a 9-6 edge after scoring four straight points. The Hawks ended up coming back, and they put together a three-point run that tied the score at 16-all. Bard scored three of the next four points, but a Raptor service error ended up stopping that scoring spree. The Raptors, however, regrouped and scored three straight points, the last of which gave them a 22-18 cushion. That lead would hold down the stretch, and Bard won the first set, 25-21.
New Paltz began exhibiting the offense dominance it has shown all season in the second set, and a kill by senior middle blocker
Brian O'Connor (Guilderland, N.Y./Guilderland) put the Hawks on top, 16-11. Bard came back, though, and five straight Raptors points tied the tally at 16-all. New Paltz overcame Bard's surge by scoring points in bunches, first going on a 3-0 run and then later scoring two and three straight points, respectively. That three-point spurt ended the set, and junior outside hitter
Gus Gregory (Walnut Creek, Calif./Las Lomas) spelled out the stanza's final score of 25-20 with an ace.
Bard never led and tied the score just once in the third, and a 5-0 run that gave the Hawks an 18-11 lead midway through the set proved to be the difference. New Paltz ended up winning the stanza, 25-20.
Finally, the fourth set was largely dictated by freshman middle blocker
Jake Roessler (Massapequa, N.Y./Massapequa), whose play during a 5-0 run gave the Hawks a sizable advantage. Roessler accounted for four of the five points during that spurt, and a service ace ended up swelling the New Paltz edge to 13-5. Bard could not recover from that point forward, and the Hawks closed out the weekend with a 25-18 triumph in the fourth set.
New Paltz received several offensive contributions, with freshman middle blocker
C.J. Borfitz (Inwood, N.Y./Lawrence) and Roessler leading the way with 15 and 12 kills, respectively. Borfitz also worked with an economy of swings, achieving his 15 terminations on just 18 total attempts (.722 hitting percentage). Sophomore setter/defensive specialist
Kevin Nardone (Port Washington, N.Y./Paul D. Schreiber) ran a 5-1 offense and dished out 50 assists, while Tuminelli provided 10 digs. Nardone played solid front-row defense, too, with five total blocks.
For Bard, senior outside hitter Billy Williams keyed the attack with nine kills, while senior setter Henry Kasiske offered up 24 assists. Kasiske and Williams each finished with seven digs, while sophomore middle blocker Alex Adams totaled four blocks.
