The Boston College volleyball team turned over an initially bad start at the Yale Invitational in New Haven, Conn. to sweep Yale in the final game of the tournament, which consisted of three games.
The Eagles opened the invitational against the University at Albany, losing a one-set lead and eventually falling in five sets on Friday evening.
The Great Danes took a highly contested first set, negating Katty Workman’s two kills that gave BC a 24-23 lead toward the end of the first set. Albany managed two kills and took advantage of a BC attacking error to win the first set 26-24.
The Eagles fought back to win the next two sets, claiming the second set by a margin of 25-19 due to limited mistakes and clinical kills. The third set was close for most of the game, but the Eagles managed to come out on top after gaining a lead late in the set, giving the Eagles the lead in the match as well.
The fourth set saw BC start off somewhat shakily, committing three errors and setting the Eagles up with a 4-11 deficit at the beginning of the game.
The Eagles ended up leveling the game at 17, leading to a closely matched game, but Albany gained a slight edge at 26-24.
The match went into its fifth set, tied at two apiece. BC took the initial lead, but once more, the set turned into a back-and-forth game. Finally, the Great Danes edged out the Eagles 16-14 toward the end of the set.
After losing to the University at Albany on Friday, the Eagles played two games on Saturday—No. 18 University of Minnesota at 11 a.m. and then Yale University at 7 p.m. Against the Gophers, what initially looked like a strong start turned into an incredible momentum change as BC won the first two sets, but Minnesota clinched the last three.
The Eagles started strong, winning the first two games convincingly, 25-12 and 25-22, but then the Gophers took over events, winning the next sets 25-18, 25-15, and 15-13.
Both teams played hard in the last set’s close contest. Senior Courtney Castle switched into the libero role in an attempt to atone for two straight set losses. The Eagles stayed within one point of the Gophers for much of the game, culminating in a 12-13 score. BTwo Minnesota kills downed BC at the very end.
Pin hitters Julia Topor and Workman starred for the Eagles on the stat sheet, racking up 12 and 11 kills, respectively. A lack of errors led middle Brittany Pavich to a .750 hitting percentage, with nine kills in 12 total attacks.
The Eagles did end the invitational on a win, sweeping the host team in three sets. The Eagles handily won the first set 25-13, claimed a closer second set at 25-21, then closed out the final game 25-19.
Pavich and Workman were both continually active throughout this match. Workman had 12 kills and a .611 hitting percentage, while Pavich had 11 kills and a .714 hitting percentage.
The Eagles hit their way to a .442 percentage, as opposed to Yale’s which was just 182. In fact, in the first 25-13 set, Yale had a -.029 hitting percentage, committing nine errors with eight kills.
The 3-0 win was the Eagles’ third sweep of the season. In fact, BC has yet to win a game that was not a sweep. On top of that, the Eagles’ only losses have been in matches that have gone to a fifth and final set.
This upcoming weekend, the Eagles head to New York for the Long Island University Invitational. Their first game will be against Temple at 4:30 p.m. Then, on Saturday, the Eagles will take on LIU Brooklyn followed by North Kentucky in a double header.
Featured Image by Graham Beck / Heights Senior Staff
