Women's Volleyball Has Three-Match Winning Streak Halted by Lehman

BRONX, N.Y. – The St. Joseph's College (Brooklyn) women's volleyball team fell 3-1 (20-25, 25-21, 25-20, 27-25) in a tightly contested non-conference match to Lehman College on Thursday night at the APEX.

St. Joseph's (9-6, 4-0 HVIAC) sees their three-match winning streak come to a halt while Lehman (16-6, 5-1 CUNYAC) moves a season-high ten games over .500 and has won three of their last four matches.

The match was tight throughout with the Lightning holding the largest lead of nine points, 24-15, in the second set.

The St. Joseph's defense held its own for most of the match as six Lady Bears had double-digit digs highlighted by reigning USCAA and HVIAC Player of the Week sophomore Lauren GaNun (Breezy Point, N.Y./Fontbonne Hall) who tallied her fifth double-double of the season contributing a team-high 13 digs to the cause to go along with her team-high 18 kills while hitting an efficient .255. Senior Megan Moran (Syosset, N.Y./St. Dominic's) fell one kill shy of her second double-double of the year finishing with nine kills and ten digs. Senior Sabrina Cornia (Miller Place, N.Y./Miller) helped control the offense dishing out 19 assists while bringing up 12 digs.

Lehman was led by the duo of Jo-Marie Aquino and Imani Dubois who each recorded double-doubles finishing with a combined 34 out of the team's 44 kills and together had 36 digs.

St. Joseph's got off to a good start in the opening set as after the Lightning took the first point of the match the Lady Bears would go on a 6-1 run to take an early 6-2 lead and they did not look back taking the first set without trailing again in the frame.  St. Joseph's was led by GaNun who had six kills including three straight after Lehman had gotten within 17-15 late in the set.

The second stanza saw the Lady Bears jump out to an early 5-3 lead helped by a pair of kills from Moran but the Lightning answered scoring five unanswered to build an 8-5 edge and led the remainder of the set  to tie the match up at 1-1.

The two teams started out going back and forth in the third set as the score was tied at 6-6 in the early going. Lehman would then score five points in a row to take an 11-6 lead before St. Joseph's responded with four straight points of their own to close the gap to 11-10, forcing a Lightning timeout. Lehman came out of the timeout with four consecutive points to take a 15-11 lead and remained in front for the remainder of the set to take a 2-1 lead in the match.

The fourth and most pivotal set for the Lady Bears was the closest of the match as both teams understood the magnitude of the set and the Lightning jumped out to an early 8-4 advantage.  St. Joseph's responded with four points in a row to tie the set at 8-8. With the score tied at 18-18 and the match on the line the teams traded points with their being six ties and six lead changes forcing a tiebreaker as the score was knotted up at 25-25. Lehman took both points in the tiebreaker to finish off the set and the match.

The Lady Bears return to action tomorrow evening as they play at CUNYAC member York College (NY) with a start time of 7:30 p.m.