NEW YORK, N.Y. (October 14, 2017) – The Rutgers University-Newark women's volleyball team won a pair of matches Saturday at Baruch College to get back on track. The Scarlet Raiders opened the action with a sweep of Maritime College, and came back to sweep host Baruch in the nightcap.
Rutgers-Newark improves to 8-12 overall and will host William Paterson University in a New Jersey Athletic Conference (NJAC) match in The Golden Dome Tuesday night. Baruch moves to 9-12 overall, and Maritime ends the day at 9-11.
Rutgers-Newark 3, Maritime 0
Rutgers-Newark emphatically snapped a seven-match skid in the opening match of the day, sweeping Maritime by set scores of 25-10, 25-11 and 25-15.
The Privateers doubled up Newark early on in the action (4-2), but Rutgers outscored Maritime 23-6 the rest of the set to take a 1-0 lead. Things turned on the service game of senior
Sue Riley who propelled the Raiders on an 11-0 run to turn a two-point deficit into a 13-4 lead. Riley had three aces in the rally and senior
Morgan Schweitzer had two kills as R-N cruised to the 1-0 lead.
After junior
Cassie Luken ended the first set with back-to-back aces, freshman
Karly Gregoire followed suit with two aces of her own as Rutgers-Newark opened an early 6-1 lead in the second. The Privateers trimmed the lead to two at 6-4, but a 10-1 run all-but sealed the 2-0 lead for Rutgers-Newark. Sophomore
Brione Lockett aced Maritime twice and Schweitzer had multiple winners in the run with the latter putting away a kill to clinch the set.
Maritime came out with two quick points in the third, but four aces in a 6-0 run for Luken put Rutgers-Newark in control. Gregoire set sophomore
Comfort Akinbo for a hammer and a 14-7 Scarlet Raider lead, with three Ford kills and a Privateer error sealing the sweep.
Rutgers-Newark hit an exceptional .438 in the match, including a .500 mark in the first set. The Scarlet Raiders totaled 63 points behind 41 kills, 17 aces and five rejections, racking up 37 assists and 29 digs.
Schweitzer (14), Ford (10) and Akinbo led the attacking unit, while Luken (six) and Gregoire (four) combined for 10 of the team's 17 aces. Akinbo, Ford and Luken all recorded multiple blocks, while Gregoire handed out a match-high 29 assists. Riley lifted a match-high 13 digs in addition to her three aces and five assists.
Season-High! The .438 hitting percentage was a season-high for Rutgers-Newark
Rutgers-Newark 3, Baruch 0
R-N made it 2-for-2 with a triumph over host Baruch in the nightcap, winning by set scores of 27-25, 25-14 and 25-16.
It was the Bearcats that came out of the gate strong, opening an early 9-5 edge and extending to a five-point margin moments later (12-7). The Scarlet Raiders chipped away until back-to-back-to-back kills from freshman
Samantha Kemmerer, Schweitzer and Akinbo knotted the set a 20, and after a Schweitzer kill fought off one set point for the Bearcats, two-straight Baruch errors allowed R-N to take a 1-0 lead via a 27-25 set victory.
After splitting the first 10 points of the second evenly, a 4-0 run allowed Rutgers take control. A Luken spike and Ford ace made it 13-6 in favor of the Scarlet Raiders, and a solo-block from Akinbo pushed the lead to eight (16-8). Back-to-back aces from Luken upped the margin to 10 (19-9), and R-N cruised the rest of the way to a 2-0 lead.
With the score tied at four in the early stages of the third, the Scarlet Raiders pocketed 10 of the next 13 tallies to go on top 14-7. Another Akinbo solo-denial pushed the lead to a set-high eight (17-9), and after Baruch had fought back within three (18-15), Schweitzer sent one back and she teamed with Ford on another to push the lead back to five (20-15). After Baruch's mini-run, Rutgers-Newark put the clamps down, scoring seven of the final eight points to lock up a second-straight sweep.
Luken ended the match with eight kills, four aces and nine digs, while Schweitzer delivered eight kills and four blocks. Ford had seven winners (.368) and three rejections, and Gregoire dished out a match-high 29 assists to go with five digs. Lockett had two aces, three kills and nine digs, and senior
Sue Riley lifted a match-high 23 digs. Senior
Chrissy Campanelli tallied two aces and eight digs
R-N hit .150 overall, while holding Baruch to a .000 hitting percentage, and the Scarlet Raiders racked up 53.5 points on the back of 35 kills, nine aces and nine blocks.
Fans should visit
www.rutgersnewarkathletics.com Tuesday for links to follow the WPU match live.
Want more Rutgers-Newark women's volleyball? Follow @ScarletRaiders and @RUNVolleyball on twitter!
