While the Springfield College women’s basketball team hosted their NEWMAC quarterfinal game against MIT in Blake Area, the men’s volleyball team had their annual home game against Elms College inside of Dana Gymnasium. Regardless of the chance of hardwood, the Pride were able to pick up a victory in three sets (25-15, 25-16, 25-18). This moves their record to 12-2 on the season, continuing as a threat to win a national championship.
Even after the victory, head coach Charlie Sullivan realizes there’s still work to be done.
“I think we have a lot of work to do for Saturday,” Sullivan said. “We got to get in the gym and get ready for the biggest match of the season.”
This match is against Stevens Institute of Technology, a formidable powerhouse in Division III volleyball. Springfield enters ranked No. 4 according to the AVCA coaches poll, while Stevens sits at No. 3. Springfield lost to Stevens last February in four sets.
“They’re the best team we’ve seen so far this year,” Sullivan said. “We got to be efficient, [be] good mentally, physically, technically [and] strategically.”
Springfield started the game with a quick 5-0 run, highlighted by two service aces from Carter Durivage and kills from Sam Levinson and Jake DesLauriers. Springfield and Elms traded off points for a little bit, with neither team scoring more than two consecutive points until the very end of the set. While Elms played Springfield evenly for a large chunk of the set, the 5-0 run and consistent play from the team gave Springfield a 1-0 lead, with Chris Rouleau having four kills and Levinson and DesLauriers with three.
However, Elms took the early lead in set two, with Rafa Artero putting them on the board first. A service error from Joey Priesche and a kill from Nicholas Uschmann, extended their advantage to 5-2. Elms continued to slowly but surely grow their lead in set two, getting a 6-3 lead before Springfield came storming back yet again. Going on an 8-0 run, the set featured two aces from senior Richard Eber Jr., a transfer from Saint Francis University.
“Like everyone I talk about that’s new, they’ve made our gym more competitive,” Sullivan said. “We’re really benefiting from all the new guys we got.”
Outside of the two aces, the rest of the points came from service and attack errors with the exception of one kill by Priesche. After getting up to a 14-8 lead, Springfield started to squander their lead, allowing Elms to go on a 4-0 run of their own. Now 14-12, Springfield was able to lock in and keep the small lead they had, with a booming kill from Eber Jr. helping the Pride get the lead back up to five points. This kill also helped give Springfield a 3-0 run, as Springfield then found themselves one set away from the sweep.
Similar to the second set, Elms got out to a slight lead before Springfield yet again came back to retake the lead. Trailing 5-3, Springfield capitalized on a service error by Uschmann and attack errors from Najere Bolan and Algenis Sanchez. After taking advantage of Elms’ errors, the two teams traded off points until Elms got their lead back with a service error from Will Kirchhoff and an ace from Hunter Ladouceur. Now 9-8 Elms, Springfield went on another run and got them up to a 12-9 lead, which they would not relinquish.
With the run consisting of kills from AJ Seveland and Priesche with an ace from Dyllan Nguyen, the Pride continued to maintain their cushion and grow their lead slowly but surely, topping Elms in the process, now on a four-game win streak. Seveland finished with the team lead in kills with eight, while Eber Jr. finished with a whopping five aces.
After their highly anticipated match versus Stevens, the Pride will travel to SUNY New Paltz to take on the Hawks.