LORETTO, Pa. - The Fairleigh Dickinson women's volleyball team dropped a five-set thriller to Saint Francis U on Sunday afternoon.
The Knight came back from a 2-0 deficit in the match to force a decisive fifth set. The Red Flash won the first set 25-15 and the second set 25-23 before the Knights took set three 25-12 and set four 25-9. The Red Flash closed the match out with a 15-11 victory in the fifth set.
The loss drops the Knights to 3-26 overall and 1-10 in Northeast Conference play. Saint Francis U improves to 6-19 overall and 1-9 in the NEC.
The Red Flash tied things up 3-3 in the first set before score four more points to take a 7-3 lead over the Knights. Saint Francis continued to dominate, eventually building up a 20-10 advantage. Fairleigh Dickinson put four more points on the board, closing the game to 23-15, but the Red Flash ended things with two kills from Sophie Mudock and Kelsey Roush.
Saint Francis U opened up the second set with a 5-0 advantage, after benefiting from four straight Fairleigh Dickinson attacking errors. The Knights battled, bringing the score with three points – 7-10 – following a Caroline Laton (Kinnelon, N.J./Kinnelon) kill. The Knights cut the score to just one point, several times, and eventually tied things up, 18-18. Although Fairleigh Dickinson was able to keep things close, they could not overtake the Red Flash, who ended the second set on a Roush kill.
The third set played out differently for the Knights than the first two. Fairleigh Dickinson gained momentum quickly and took an immediate lead. Annabel Reyes (Teaneck, N.J./Immaculate Heart Academy) opened the set with a kill to put the Knights on the board and they built up a 7-2 lead before the Red Flash called a timeout. The Knights displayed dominance for the remainder of the set, outscoring Saint Francis U 18-10. They closed out the third set with five straight points, starting with a kill from Abigail Strebig (Brookfield, Wisc./Brookfield Central). Laton added a service ace and Rebecca Sabol (Dublin, Ohio/Dublin Coffman) tallied to straight kills to head to the fourth set.
The Knights continued the momentum in the fourth set and held the Red Flash to just nine points. Fairleigh Dickinson eventually built up an 11-2 lead following two kills in a row from Strebig as well as a Laton kill. Another five straight points built up the Knights' advantage to 17-4. An Erika Sullivan (Elk Grove, Calif./Pleasant Grove) kill and a Laton and Wyckoff block gave the Knights the last two points they needed to force a fifth set.
The final set was even from the start, with the teams exchanging points and tying things up several times. The set would be tied eight times before the Red Flash took the lead, which they would hold until the end. A bad Red Flash set tied things up at nine but they went on to score four straight points to take a 13-9 lead. A Reyes kill cut the Red Flash lead to 14-11 but a kill from Breanna Opera ended the set and the match.
The Knights hit .128 compared to Saint Francis U's .096. Fairleigh Dickinson also had 13 blocks compared to the Red Flash's nine.
Reyes finished with 10 kills and six blocks for the Knights while Strebig had 10 kills and a team-leading seven blocks.
Josephine Gallagher (Aurora, Ill./Rosary) recorded 22 assists while Savanna Wray (Peoria, Ariz./Sunrise Mountain) added 20 digs.
The Knights are back in action next Saturday at Sacred Heart at 1 p.m.
