SCHENECTADY, N.Y. – The Union College women's volleyball team will play a postseason match on its home court for the first time since 2008 when the fourth-seeded Garnet Chargers host fifth-seeded Rochester Institute of Technology in the first round of the Liberty League Tournament on Tuesday at 6 p.m. at Viniar Athletic Center.
POSTSEASON HISTORY: Union is making its sixth appearance in the Liberty League Tournament since the postseason switched to its current qualification format in 2011. Union is 3-5 in those five appearances (2013-16, 2022) and 2-0 as the higher seed, earning victories as the second seed in 2013 and 2015. The team is 31-40 all-time in Liberty League Tournament play, including back-to-back Liberty League titles in 2007 and 2008 that saw Union go 4-0 each season.
PLAYOFF POSITIONING: Union (19-10, 4-4 Liberty League) finished the regular season in a three-way tie for fourth place in the conference standings with RIT (18-13, 4-4 Liberty League) and Skidmore College, but the Garnet Chargers beat both teams during the regular season to earn the tiebreaker. The team's fourth-place finish is the program's highest seed since placing third in the seven-team Liberty League in 2016.
UNION VS. RIT: Union and RIT have met 25 times on the court, with the Tigers holding a 15-10 edge in the all-time series. Curiously, only three of the 25 meetings have come in Schenectady, while eight have been played in Rochester and 14 have been contested at neutral sites. The teams have met twice in postseason play, with the Tigers getting the best of Union in the NYSWCAA State Tournament way back in 1991 and 2002.
LAST MEETING: The Garnet Chargers snapped a six-match losing streak to RIT with a hard-fought 3-1 win earlier this season in Rochester. The Tigers (.255) hit better than Union (.177) on the day, but the visitors got 10 kills from junior
Shannon McGrath, a match-high 18 digs from junior
Georgia Pool, and four blocks apiece from sophomores
Maddie McCarron and
Erin Stevens in the victory.
19 WINS AND COUNTING: Union's 19 wins so far this season under third-year head coach
Annie DeLoid are the most for the program since winning 25 matches in 2016, the last in a string of four straight 20-win seasons. DeLoid's 45 wins over her first three seasons are the fifth-highest total among all Union volleyball coaches in their first three years at the helm.
ACES WILD: Union ranks second in the Liberty League and 38th in Division III with 261 service aces this season, an average of 2.56 per set. Individually, junior
Shannon McGrath ranks second in the conference and 17th in the country with 66 aces in her first 100 sets of the year, while classmate
Georgia Pool ranks second on the team with 48 aces.
JUST DIG IT: The last time these two teams met, junior
Georgia Pool recorded a match-high 18 digs to become the 17th player in program history reach the 1,000-dig plateau for her career. She is the first Union player since Gillian Gore '21 in 2019 to reach quadruple figures and currently ranks 15th all-time at the school with 1,188 digs, just 14 digs away from 12th place and 117 digs away from a spot in the top-10. The junior ranks second in the Liberty League by averaging 4.46 digs per set this season.
BLOCK PARTY: Sophomore
Maddie McCarron leads the Liberty League and ranks 30th in Division III by averaging 1.04 blocks per set so far this season, with 88 blocks (including a conference-best 26 solos) in 85 sets. In her first two seasons at Union, McCarron has put down 176 blocks and added 330 kills on .281 hitting.
KILLING IT: Junior
Shannon McGrath has led the team in kills in each of her first three seasons on campus, the first Union player to do so since Rachel Wyman '16 led the squad in each of her four years from 2012-15. McGrath's 317 kills so far in 2024 are a new career high and rank second in the Liberty League this season, while she also ranks second in kills per set (3.17).
LENDING AN ASSIST: First-year
Allie Kronenberg ranks third in the Liberty League with a team-leading 794 assists in so far in her rookie season, including 13 matches of 30 or more. Her total marks the most assists for a Union player since Sage Shimamoto '21 dished out 1,077 assists as a first-year in 2017.
ABOUT THE TIGERS: RIT is in the postseason for the sixth straight season and looking for its first conference championship since 2018. Cat Vento ranks third on the team in kills (237) with a .318 hitting percentage that leads the Liberty League and also leads the conference in total blocks (107), while Mia Gerber has put down a team-leading 293 kills to rank third in the conference. Hailey Blixt paces all conference players with 69 service aces and 506 digs, while Sydney Neff's 1,032 assists are also tops in the conference. Only 11 of the Tigers' 31 matches have finished in three sets this year, including seven five-setters that have allowed RIT to play 18 more sets than any other Liberty League team this season.
WHAT'S NEXT: The Union-RIT winner will advance to the Liberty League Tournament semifinals on Friday at top-seeded Ithaca College.
2024 Liberty League Tournament
First Round – Tuesday, November 12, 2024
#6 Skidmore at #3 Clarkson, 6 p.m.
#5 RIT at #4 Union, 6 p.m.
Semifinal Round – Friday, November 15, 2024 (at Ithaca)
#6 Skidmore/#3 Clarkson vs. #2 William Smith, 4 p.m.
#5 RIT/#4 Union at #1 Ithaca, 6:30 p.m.
Championship Game – Saturday, November 16, 2024 (at Ithaca)
Semifinal #1 Winner vs. Semifinal #2 Winner, 2 p.m.
