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CASTLETON, Vt. -- The Eastern Connecticut State University women's volleyball team dodged two bullets in extending its overall winning streak to five matches and its road record to 8-1 this year with a five-set Little East Conference victory at VTSU Castleton before posting a four-set non-conference triumph over Fitchburg State University Saturday afternoon at Glenbrook Gymnasium. 

Despite having won all seven previous matches against Castleton (7-8, 0-2 LEC) in the all-time series, Eastern (12-3, 2-0 LEC) had to rally from two sets down Saturday to post the win by scores of 17-25, 22-25, 25-12, 25-21, 15-7. Although it was Eastern's third five-set win in four attempts this year, it was the first time this year that the Warriors had to dig out of a 2-sets-to-none hole.

Coming back soon after rallying past the Spartans for the emotional win, Eastern dropped the opening set to a Fitchburg State (0-14) team which had managed to win only two sets all year in losing all 13 of its matches. Having not lost to the Falcons in 46 years, Eastern rallied to win the next three sets by an average of 12 points to extend its winning streak to five and improve its record away from Francis E. Geissler Gymnasium this year to 8-1. Set scores were 19-25, 25-20, 25-12, 25-8.

Having never been pushed to five sets in seven previous wins against Castleton and having dropped only three total sets in those victories, Eastern scored the first three points in the fifth set behind the serving of senior Liz Squier (Trevor, WI) on Saturday, and after the Spartans answered with three of their own to force the only tie, Eastern reeled off six straight to move out to a 9-3 lead and was never headed. While Eastern scored ten of its 15 points on kills (with a .292 attack percentage), the Spartans were just 2-of-20 with three errors for a -.050 mark. First-year player Allegra Copeland (Beaumont, CA) put down both of her attack attempts and first-year junior transfer Stephanie Nemecek (Farmingdale, NY) added two kills on four tries, junior Brooke Praskievicz (Moodus) dug up four balls and served five of the points in the run of six straight, sophomore libero Emerson Conigliaro (Raleigh, NC) added three digs, and Nemecek and sophomore Addison Soleau (East Lyme) each contributed a block assist.

In nine sets on the afternoon, Copeland led the team with 19 kills (and three service aces), junior Haley Jo Bridges (Monticello, NY) adding 16 kills (and a career-high 12 blocks), with a team-high .294 attack percentage, sophomore Emma Robinson (Westlake Village, CA) 13 kills with a .257 percentage and Nemecek 11 kills (and seven blocks) with a .259 mark; Squier totalled 33 assists and four service aces, first-year setter Sonya Nielsen (Waterford, WI) adding 27 assists and a team-high six service aces. Defensively, Conigliaro dug up 22 balls, Praskievicz -- last week's LEC Defensive Player-of-the-Week -- and first-year junior transfer Sarah Eldredge (South Windsor) 19 each, Robinson 14 and Squier and Nielsen 11 apiece.

Eastern resumes its long-time rivalry with Western Connecticut (the 66-match rivalry dating back to 1979) when it hosts the Wolves in LEC play Wednesday at 6 p.m. Western (12-4, 1-1 LEC) had a seven-match winning streak snapped Saturday with a four-set home loss to 2024 LEC playoff runner-up Plymouth State University (12-4, 2-0 LEC). After eliminating higher-seeded WestConn in five sets in the LEC playoffs in 2021 and 2022, Eastern has lost four straight to the Wolves and has been eliminated by WestConn from the LEC playoffs each of the past two years.