Box Score New Paltz, NY – The State University of New York at New Paltz men's volleyball picked up a vital United Volleyball Conference (UVC) win over St. John Fisher College, 25-18, 26-24, 28-26, 25-18. After losing their six-game win streak to Springfield College on Thursday, the Hawks bounced back and moved to 12-5 overall and 3-1 in UVC play, tied with Nazareth and Elmira College for third place.
 
The Hawks came out hot and jumped out to a 5-0 lead forcing a timeout from St. John Fisher College. Three points later senior co-captain Ryan Cole picked up his third kill of the set and SUNY New Paltz extended their lead to 7-1. However, the Cardinals started to get their momentum going and was able to bring the score closer at 8-10 thanks to a couple three-point serving runs. The Hawks weren't going to let St. John Fisher stay in it for long though and a solid swing from Bradley Schneider capped off a four point run to push the score up to 21-14. SUNY New Paltz coasted through the rest of the way and a Cole kill sealed the set at 25-18.
 
The second set started out back and forth, but when the Hawks won five of six points to take a 13-9 advantage, the momentum had shifted in their favor. Once again the Cardinals pushed back, and with some tough serving from Joe Kenney they tied the set back up at 13. Later in the set, Cole recorded a kill and an ace on back-to-back points to help SUNY New Paltz close in on taking a two sets to none with a 22-18 lead. The resilience from St. John Fisher showed again as they held off three sest points to force the score to 24-24, but the Hawks managed to pull out the next two points to take a two sets to none lead.
 
With a two set lead, and a big match coming the next day against Nazareth College, head coach Radu Petrus used the opportunity to give his bench the chance to show their stuff. "It was a good opportunity for all our players to show their skills," said Petrus. "It was also good mental preparation for the younger players, and we needed this win so they came through."
 
After letting three set points slip away again, the Hawks were unable to hold off the Cardinals and they dropped the third set 28-26.
 
Petrus had faith in his team and his younger players so he kept the same lineup on the court for the fourth set. With SUNY New Paltz leading 17-14, senior co-captain Anthony Bonilla, who has been dealing with an ankle injury, stepped up the serving line and kept St. John Fisher out of system to help increase the lead to 22-14. The advantage was too much to come back from for the Cardinals and Aaron Carrk put the exclamation point on the match with a big kill on the outside to close out the victory.
 
It was a well-rounded effort on offense for the Hawks with seven players recording four or more kills on the day. Bonilla led the team with nine kills on 18 attempts with two errors for a .389 hitting percentage. Sophomore setter Matthew Grace and senior setter Mitchell Kennedy split the setting responsibilities as they recorded 21 and 16 assists, respectively. Sophomore libero Robert Nolan reached double-digit digs with a match-high 10.
 
"As a team we want to work on discipline because although they might not have the biggest guys or the strongest hitters they are another team that wants at us," said Bonilla. "We have a target on our backs and every team wants to show their best effort to beat us so we have to we have to play our game and be able to take care of the teams that could take sets from us like they did today."
 
SUNY New Paltz takes on Nazareth College at 3 p.m. tomorrow in a crucial UVC matchup for both teams.