PURCHASE, N.Y. – The Manhattanville College women's volleyball team concluded regular season conference play on Thursday night, notching a 3-0 win over SUNY Old Westbury. The win (25-21, 25-14, 25-19) will bring Manhattanville's final record in conference to 10-1, their best record since the 2019 championship team went 11-0 in the regular season. The Valiants are now 20-6 overall on the year.
In addition to leading the team in assists with 32,
Vianca Vital (Carolina, Puerto Rico/Perpetuo Socorro) served three aces, matched with
Ayla Ruiz (Honolulu, Hawaii/St. Andrew's Schools) for the most on the night.
Grace Ballagas (Carolina, Puerto Rico/Robinson School) and
Felicity Hoffert (Smithtown, N.Y./Smithtown East) accounted for the Valiants' other three assists in the win.
It was once again a well rounded attack effort with seven different Valiants registering kills in the contest.
Alejandra Figueroa (Guaynabo, Puerto Rico/Colegio Rosa-Bell) led the way with 10, her 13
th time this season she reached double figures in the attacking category. Ruiz and
Sofia Morales (Tolland, Conn./Tolland) ended with eight kills each, while
Hannah Pena (Goshen, N.Y./Goshen) recorded seven putaways. The defensive effort was led by Ballagas, totaling 14 of the team's 37 digs. Figueroa added seven while Vital collected five.
The match opened with a back-and-forth first set, seeing six different tied scores. The Panthers would take the first large lead, opening up with a 9-5 advantage. Manhattanville responded with a 6-1 run to go back ahead. After Old Westbury tied the match at 11-11, a 3-0 Valiant run would give the home team just enough of a lead to maintain the rest of the way. The Panthers were able to make it a one point set on multiple occasions, but the Valiants mounted a response each time to hold off the resilient foe. Old Westbury cut the lead down to two at 23-21, but the Valiants would benefit from a Panther service error and ball handling error to give Manhattanville the win, 25-21.
The second set was a more dominant effort by the Valiants, with Manhattanville never trailing. The home squad began with a 5-2 advantage before serves were traded back and forth leading to a 7-5 score. It was here that Manhattanville was able to piece together their biggest run of the night, scoring nine straight points to pull away. The deficit was too much for Old Westbury to fight back from as the Valiants took a 2-0 lead with the 25-14 win.
With the Panthers' backs against the walls, Old Westbury did not go away quietly in the third set. The Panthers would lead for much of the early going, and while their advantage never grew above two, the Valiants were unable to hold control of the serve long enough to completely erase the visitors' advantage. With Old Westbury up 14-12, the Valiant were finally able to string together more than two consecutive points to go up 15-14. This would be the first of four straight 3-0 Valiant runs, with Manhattanville outscoring the Panthers 12-3 in the span to reach match point, 24-17. Old Westbury scored twice more before a Ruiz kill logged the final point of the night for the 25-19 win.
Up Next
As the Valiants await the final shakeup of the conference standings and tiebreaker procedures to determine their postseason fate, the team will play their final regular season match on Saturday. It will be Senior Day inside Kennedy Gymnasium against John Jay with a noon start.
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