ROCHESTER, N.Y. – The Union College women's volleyball team used a full team effort to take down Rochester Institute of Technology by a 3-1 (25-20, 13-25, 25-21, 25-23) score in a key Liberty League matchup at RIT's Clark Memorial Auditorium on Saturday afternoon.
Six players recorded at least four kills on the day for Union (13-5, 2-1 Liberty League), led by junior
Shannon McGrath with 10 to go with nine digs. Sophomores
Erin Stevens and
Maddie McCarron both had a team-best four blocks to go with seven and six kills, respectively, while first-year
Georgia Pinciaro also put down seven kills. Senior
Farah Elgala served up a match-best four aces, first-year
Allie Kronenberg dished out a team-leading 29 assists, and junior
Georgia Pool dug out a team-high 18 balls.
With her fifth dig of the day, Pool reached 1,000 digs for her career, the first Union player to crack quadruple-figures in that category since Gillian Gore '21 (2017-19).
Union made only one error in an excellent first set, putting down 14 kills on .382 hitting to take an early lead. RIT (14-7, 3-1 Liberty League) jumped out to a 7-3 lead to start the set, but the visitors came back with a 12-2 run to take back the lead at 15-9. Union did not let RIT get back within three points the rest of the way to take the first set.
The Garnet Chargers managed only five kills as the Tigers evened the match with a second-set win, but Union battled through the final two frames to pull out a win. The visitors trailed for almost the entirety of the third set and were down 20-13 before mounting a huge comeback. Kills by Elgala and McGrath and an Escobar ace got back three points, and the team followed up with nine straight points to finish the comeback. Elgala had four aces and Kronenberg added a block and a kill during the game-changing run.
RIT again led at the midway point of the fourth frame, taking a 13-10 lead after an 8-2 run, and the Tigers were three points from forcing a fifth set with a 22-21 lead. But an RIT error was followed by kills from Stevens and McGrath to put Union in front, and Stevens finished off the match with another kill.
Union finished the match with 40 kills and a .177 hitting percentage, while RIT put down 56 kills on .255 hitting. The difference came at the service line, as Union put down 12 aces with only one error, compared to 13 aces and 12 service errors for the Tigers.
The Garnet Chargers will continue Liberty League play on Wednesday with a 7 p.m. match at Bard College.
