No. 12 Vassar College Tops Men’s Volleyball in Hard-Fought Match, 3-0

CHICOPEE, Mass. – Elms College freshman outside hitter Jeff Vautrin (Chicopee, Mass.) downed a team-high 16 kills on 21 swings with just one error to hit .714, but No. 12 Vassar College received a match-best 18 kills from Matt Elgin (Farmington, N.Y.) to help spark the Brewers to a hard-fought, 3-0 (25-20, 25-21, 25-23) win in Saturday evening's non-conference men's volleyball match at Picknelly Arena.

With the loss, Elms moves to 9-7 overall, while Vassar improves to 11-6 on the season.

In the opening frame, Vassar held a lead for the majority of the set and notched a 24-18 lead on an assisted block from Elgin and John Konow (Chicago, Ill.). Elms fended off a pair of set point opportunities using a pair of Brewers' attacking errors to set the score at 24-20, but Charlie Caldwell (Pacific Palisades, Calif.) downed a kill to seal the first set for Vassar.

The second set saw the Brewers lead by as many as seven (17-10), but Elms rallied and pulled to within two when sophomore middle hitter Angel Castro (Carolina, Puerto Rico) rose up for a sensational solo block on an attack by Konow to set the score at 23-21 in favor of Vassar. Elgin then connected for a kill and the Brewers used a Blazers' miscue to take a 2-0 lead in the contest.

In the third set, the sides battled back and forth to nine tie scores and a 22-22 deadlock on a kill by Vautrin. Back-to-back kills by Elgin allowed Vassar to claim a 24-22 edge before a serve into the net narrowed Elms' deficit to one (24-23). Elgin then floored his 18^th kill of the match to seal the sweep.

Castro finished with nine kills and junior middle hitter Bryson Rainey (Brookline, Mass.) downed eight kills in the match for the Blazers who .270 as a team.

Junior setter Daniel Lebron (San Juan, Puerto Rico) dished out a match-high 35 assists and joined senior outside hitter Stephen Cameron (Newington, Conn.) with a match-high nine digs in the losing effort.

Vassar received six kills each from Caldwell, Patrick Donohue (East Petersburg, Pa.) and Luke Sobieraj (Chicago, Ill.) behind Elgin's 18 kills. Konow directed the Brewers to a .295 hitting percentage with 34 assists, while Colin Fearn-Johnson (Honolulu, Hawai'i) and Joe Pyne (Los Angeles, Calif.) registered a team-best seven digs each in the winning effort.

Elms is back to conference action on Tuesday, March 5 when it travels to Southern Vermont College for a 7:00 p.m. contest in Bennington, Vt.