WSOU

Recap: Seton Hall Sweeps St. John's Red Storm in Road Contest

Date: November 15, 2021

By: Ben Harris

The Seton Hall women's volleyball team poses for a photo after defeating St. John's.

Seton Hall Athletics

The Seton Hall women’s volleyball team capped off their jam-packed senior weekend in dominant fashion, sweeping the St. John's Red Storm, three sets to none.

This victory improves the Pirates record to 14-16 overall and makes them 6-10 in Big East conference play. Unfortunately, this late-season victory does not provide much in terms of tournament stakes, being that the Big East volleyball tournament only consists of the top four teams in the conference.

But nevertheless, it is great to see the Pirates staying strong in the backstretch of their season, as this win pushes them above both St. John's and Xavier in the conference standings, where they now reside in seventh place.

Sunday's dominant road victory took place a train ride away in Queens, N.Y.'s Carnesecca Arena and comes just a day after the Pirates Senior Day victory over the UConn Huskies. They defeated UConn three sets to one in historic Walsh Gymnasium on Saturday evening.

But as for Sunday's action, the Pirates were able to pull off this sweep by limiting their mistakes on the attack. The Pirates had a very solid hitting percentage of .223%, whereas the Red Storm posted a miserable .043% in that same field. Between that and St. John's' 27 attack errors, the Pirates were able to just put on a cleaner showing, leading them to victory through technically-sound play.

Progressively, the first set started in favor of the Red Storm, as the home squad got off to an early 3-0 lead. But it proved surmountable, with the Pirates able to go back and forth and tie the set at 4-4. From there, the Pirates were able to battle out to a five-point lead, with sophomore outside hitter Perri Lucas' kill making things 12-7.

The Pirates kept a lead in set one until things got tied at 22 before they scored three straight, capped by a St. John's attack error to win it 25-22.

The second set was more competitive and had visiting Pirate fans on the edge of their seats, as Seton Hall was forced to take a timeout down 16-12. But the Pirates stormed back, scoring seven straight points and continuing that scoring onslaught through the end, winning the pivotal set 25-21.

The third and final set saw the Red Storm come out very slow, as the Pirates offense had them up seven to nothing before St. John’s was forced to call a timeout and try to stop the bleeding. Things never quite came together for St John's, as the Pirates outlasted them 25-20 in the final set, sweeping the match.

Both teams had some standout performances from individual players. For Seton Hall, Lucas led the squad with nine kills, followed by senior Emilee Turner and sophomore Tsvetelina Ilieva who had eight and seven kills, respectively. Freshman libero Anna Holland also made a nice impact with a team-high 15 digs.

Then for the Red Storm, sophomore middle blocker Eleonora Tosi had a team-high seven kills while senior middle blocker Ariadni Kathariou led her squad with an impressive (and outlying) .385 hitting percentage.

This weekend of solid victories has to feel good for a Pirates team that has struggled, especially in conference play, throughout the season. This upcoming week will bring forth two final opportunities to continue this streak as the season closes out.

First, the Pirates will travel to Omaha, Neb. to take on the Creighton Bluejays on Friday evening, and then they will wrap up their season on the road once more to take on the Providence Friars on Sunday at 1 p.m. All luck goes out to this Pirates volleyball squad as they hit the hardwood for the last couple of times this season.

Ben Harris can be reached at benjamin.harris@student.shu.edu.

Posted in: Sports, Volleyball, WSOU

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