Blazer Invitational Weekend Recap

Chicopee, MA – The Elms College volleyball team opened at home this past weekend in their own Blazer Invitational. On Friday night, the Blazers fell to Colby-Sawyer College in a tough four-set match before opening Saturday with a 3-0 win against SUNY Cobleskill. The Blazers finished the weekend in a competitive 0-3 match with the Worcester Polytechnic Institute Engineers.

THE BASICS:

SCORE: Colby-Sawer 3 | SUNY Cobleskill 2

WPI 3 | Colby-Sawyer 0

WPI 3 | SUNY Cobleskill 0

HOW IT HAPPENED:

Match 1: The Blazers battled the first set in a lot of back-and-forth action that saw the Blazers and the Chargers tied at 22-22. A late push by the Chargers took the first set 25-23. The second set opened with the Blazers falling to a string of Chargers serving runs. A late push by the Blazers brought them within four with a serving run from Natalia Caraballo Rivera, but wasn't enough to take the set, falling 18-25. The Blazers came out strong in the third set opening with a 5-1 lead. Despite a late push by the Chargers, the Blazers stayed on top and won the set 25-18. The fourth set remained close including a mid-way tie at 11-11. Following a string of Chargers serving runs, the Blazers fell 16-25 in the fourth leading the Chargers to with the match 3-1.

Match 2: The Blazers came out strong in the first set, opening the match with a 6-0 serving run by Govanna Rosado. The Blazers pushed forward with two more serving runs from Laura Jensen and Natalia Caraballo Rivera and took a commanding 17-7 lead. Despite a late push from the Tigers, Elms went on to take the first set 25-16. After a opening Tiger lead, the Blazers saw another Caraballo Rivera serving run to elevate the Blazers to a 8-5 lead change. After a lot of back-and-forth play, the Blazers began to pull away at 19-18 and closed out the set following a serving run from Alanys Cruz Diaz. The third set remained close including tied scores at 15-15 before the Blazers began to pull away with a Caraballo Rivera serving run. The Blazers closed out the set 25-18 and took the match 3-0.

Match 3: The Engineers opened the first set with an early lead before the Blazers fought back to tie at 11-11. From there, a lot of back-and-forth action continued with seven more tied scores in the set before WPI closed out the set 25-23. The second set was more back-and-forth action that led to extra points. After a Blazer error, WPI took the second set 26-24. The third set had the Blazers coming out strong with a Rosado serving run to open the set 5-1. The Engineers fought back to tie the set at 8-8 and both teams stayed within 2 of each other. The Blazers saw the match on the line at 19-24, but a service run by Cruz Diaz pushed the Blazers to 22-24. The Engineers took the final point of the set (25-22) and the match 3-0.

 INSIDE THE NUMBERS:

Match 1:

Cruz Diaz and Ramos matched with 10 kills each hitting .219 and .296 respectively

Jensen led the team with 3 aces

Moore led the team with 18 digs with Cruz Diaz adding 13 and Ramos adding 12 of their own

Match 2:

Cruz Diaz led the team with 13 kills hitting a .258 clip followed closely by Ramos who added 11 kills hitting .250

 Caraballo Rivera had a team high 6 service aces and 14 digs

Rosado led the team with 30 assists and added 7 digs of her own

Match 3:

Cruz Diaz led the team with 15 kills and a .244 hitting percentage followed by Ramos adding in 12 kills of her own hitting .233

Ramos led the team with 3 service aces with Rosado adding 2 of her own and three other players adding 1 each (Christie, Carabllo Rivera, Cruz Diaz)

Ramos led the team in digs with 16 followed by Caraballo Rivera (15) and Cruz Diaz (12)

FROM THE DESK OF COACH OLIVER:

"It was a challenging weekend being short our starting Libero but I thought some players really stepped up and it made a big impact. We fell short to Colby sawyer but that had some smart hitters. Looking over that game, I made a few changes going into Saturday and those changes really came through. Natalia stepped in as Libero and she made a huge impact defensively for our team. Govanna ran a solid offense and all our hitters contributed to our victory over SUNY Cobleskill. We knew WPI was a tough game, but even though we fell short, the girls played a solid match overall. Great weekend overall to learn what we need to correct for our future matches."

UP NEXT:

- The Blazers are back on the road again this weekend, continuing their conference play Tuesday 9/7 against Emmanuel College for a 7PM start.

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