#2 Women's Volleyball Survives Epic Five-Set Battle with #3 USMMA and Advances to Skyline Finals

When and where

November 9, 2023 – Purchase, NY

The second-seeded St. Joseph's University-New York (L.I.) women's volleyball team avenged their 2022 Skyline Conference semifinal loss to the United States Merchant Marine Academy with an epic five-set victory over the #3 Mariners on Thursday evening.

Records

#2 St. Joseph's (L.I.) 16-10; #3 USMMA 14-12

Top Performers

• Senior Madison Gremli led all players with a career-high 22 kills and finished with 13 digs and a pair of blocks

• Junior Jackie Wolf recorded a double-double of 12 kills and 14 digs

• Libero Sarah Montefusco collected a career-best 31 digs

• Setter Katie D'Angelo finished with a career-high 46 assists and 22 digs

How it happened

• Both teams opened the semifinal match strong with momentum shifting between both sides. With the score knotted at 21, the Golden Eagles claimed the next three points to go ahead 24-21. The Mariners got back-to-back points before a ball-handling error from setter Alexa Tipps sealed the 25-23 win in favor of St. Joseph's

• USMMA responded quickly in set two grabbing an early 7-2 lead. The Mariners would maintain their distance to even the match with a 25-15 win 

• Set three saw five lead changes and 11 tied scores before a 4-0 run in favor of USMMA secured a 25-20 victory and a 2-1 match lead

• On the brink of elimination, the Golden Eagles broke away from the Mariners with a 5-0 streak midway through the fourth set, 19-13, before pushing the match to a decisive fifth set with a 25-17 win

• Tied at 8 in the final frame, momentum started to move in favor of the Mariners with six of the following nine points going in their favor to set up their first match-point chance, 14-11. Kills from freshman Nina Vanderhoof and Gremli kept SJLI alive before an attack error from USMMA's Amy Jones evened the score at 14. A Mariner kill set up their third match-point opportunity, but Meredith Buchanan's attack sailed long moving the score to 15-15. SJLI's Gremli would go on to knock down back-to-back kills and secure the set 17-15 and the 3-2 match win

Up next

The Golden Eagles advance to the finals and will take on the winner of top-seeded Manhattanville College and #4 Farmingdale State on Saturday, November 11th at 2:00 pm.

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