By Liam Reilly
@liampreilly852
The Springfield College women’s volleyball team extended their winning streak to three games as they defeated Smith 3-1 on Tuesday, Oct. 8 at Blake Arena. The win moves the Pride to 10-4.
Prior to the game, the teams found themselves as two of the top teams in the conference. Smith held an unbeaten record in conference play coming in (3-0), and the Pride were just behind them at 3-1.
Springfield and Smith faced off against each other, battling every set with intense ferocity with the first set starting out knotted at three. Smith took a 9-4 lead, but the duo of Ahunna James and Natalie Billet led a Springfield rally to tie the set at 10-10. Smith ultimately won the set 25-20 after taking advantage of attack and service errors from the Pride.
The second set once again started out tied, this time at four apiece, until the Pioneers marched to a 15-12 lead. Springfield quickly knotted the score at 16 with kills from Emily Keaveney and Maeve Voltz. The Pride jumped to a 21-17 after a handful of Smith errors, causing the Pioneers to take a timeout. The Pride ended the second set with a slam as Voltz blocked the Smith attack to win set two 25-21 and even the match up at 1-1.
Voltz is in her third year on the team, and is continuing to be a force for Springfield with 148 points and 58 blocks. Springfield head coach Moira Long spoke on the impact Voltz has.
“Maeve was great,” Long said. “Being able to close the block, I think that’s huge for us.”
In set three both teams continued to battle neck-and-neck, until Springfield erupted to a 15-11 lead. More errors from Smith and another Voltz kill pushed the score to 18-13 in favor of the Pride. Springfield continued to take advantage of errors from Smith, winning the third set 25-19 and leading the match 2-1.
Looking to claim their tenth victory of the year, the Pride roared to a 10-2 lead in the fourth set – leading Smith head coach Greg Walker to call his second, and final, timeout. Springfield extended their lead to 14-6 after a pair of kills from James, and Voltz spiked two kills of her own to set the Pride up 24-18. After a long point, Voltz hammered home another kill, ending the set and the match.
While getting the conference victory and its third in a row was a positive for Springfield, the win was just a little bit sweeter for Long. The win marked her 300th as the helm of the Pride volleyball program, and came just weeks after nabbing her 600th as a collegiate head coach. Long took over the program in 2011 from the legendary Joel Dearing, and is on track to break his campus coaching win record that stands at 595.
Though the Pride lost the first set, they were able to capture three straight set victories. Voltz shared advice the team said about not letting themselves get down.
“As a team we always say that our conference is one of the best and the other teams are going to get points,” Voltz said. “They’re a great team so we just have to keep up the same energy that we have throughout the match, start the fight and finish the fight.”
A key part to Springfield’s win was being able to neutralize Smith’s offense. Before tonight, the Pioneers led the NEWMAC in points, assists and were in a tie for the best hitting percentage.
“They’re super fast tempo,” Long said. “It came down to us serving tough and attacking seams and not right in the platform. We say using our toolbox and changing things up, not just using our hammer.”
The Pride will be back at Blake Arena against Amherst this Thursday, Oct. 8th at 7 p.m.