WILLIMANTIC, Conn. -- Sophomore Emma Wheeler had two kills and junior Christina Leduc and junior Katie Gunderman one each as the Connecticut College women's volleyball team snapped a 10-all tie in the decisive fifth set on the way to a non-conference victory over Eastern Connecticut State University.
Conn (4-5) bounced back from a 2-1 deficit to win the final two sets and hand Eastern (9-5) its fourth straight loss this year and defeat the Warriors for the 11th straight time in the series dating back to 2007.
Conn won by scores of 25-12, 20-25, 23-25, 25-20, 15-10.
Conn forced a decisive game by breaking from a 13-13 tie in the fourth set by scoring four straight points -- getting consecutive kills from junior Annie Wibbelsman -- and never gave up the lead en route to the five-point win.
Before the start of the match, senior Abby Stern was presented
a ball commemorating the 1,000th kill of her career which came
this past Saturday at Keene State College. Stern is the tenth
player in program history with 1,000 kills.
(Photo by Jon Wilson '22)
The Camels scored the first three points of the fifth set before the Warriors battled back to take a two-point lead midway through the set. With Eastern leading, 9-7, the Camels scored eight of the final nine points, getting two kills from Wheeler, Gunderman and Leduc and one from junior Avery Light to highlight the final run.
In that final set, Conn attacked at .286 while the Warriors managed just .077.
Offensively for Conn, Light had ten kills and a .345 attack percentage on the night, Leduc 16 kills, and sophomore Natasha Shrivastava 43 assists. Defensively, five players combined for 16 block assists and a solo, let by Wibbelsman (six blocks) and Light (four). Freshman libero Julia Dailey led both teams with 33 digs, Leduc adding 17 digs and was perfect on 22 reception attempts.
Eastern seniors
Anna Barry (Andover) and
Alaetra Long (Lincoln, NE) each had 19 kills. Barry attacked at .359, but the rest of the team attacked at just .113. Senior
Meg Verizzi (Lebanon) had 54 assists to eclipse the 1,000-assist mark and finished the night with 1,019 for her career. Defensively, Stern had 22 digs, Long 19 and junior
Paula Perez (Caguas, P.R.) 16. Perez also had a .964 success rate on 28 reception attempts.
Eastern visits Castleton University Saturday for a 1 p.m. Little East Conference match and also faces SUNY Delhi at 3 p.m. in a non-conference match at Castleton.
