Women's Volleyball Picks Up Win Over Brooklyn in Regular Season Finale

BROOKLYN, N.Y. – Sophomore Lauren GaNun (Breezy Point, N.Y./Fontbonne Hall) and senior Megan Moran (Syosset, N.Y./St. Dominic's) both set new career-highs in kills as the St. Joseph's College (Brooklyn) women's volleyball team concluded their 2013 regular season with a 3-1 (28-26, 25-17, 30-32, 25-23) victory over borough rival Brooklyn College on Wednesday night a the West Quad Center.

St. Joseph's (13-7, 7-0 HVIAC) finishes the regular season on a four-match winning streak heading into Sunday's Hudson Valley Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (HVIAC) Tournament while Brooklyn (10-15, 3-3 CUNYAC) has now lost four in a row following a three-match winning streak.

GaNun paced the Lady Bears offense with her eighth double-double of the season netting 25 kills to go along with a career-high 20 digs. Moran was right behind slamming down 20 kills while bringing up 19 digs for her third double-double of the year. Senior Sabrina Cornia (Miller Place, N.Y./Miller) coordinated the offense dishing out a career-high 44 assists while recording 13 digs for her eighth double-double.

The Bulldogs were led by Julia Bogdan who notched a double-double finishing with 18 kills and 15 assists.

St. Joseph's offense was consistent throughout putting down double-digit kills in each of the four sets resulting in a season-high 57 kills for the match.

 The opening set was evenly played as neither team could distance themselves from each other. With the score tied at 18-18 late in the set, the Lady Bears would take a brief 20-18 lead before Brooklyn came back and took the lead 21-20. However, St. Joseph's rallied for two straight points to take a 22-21 advantage forcing a Bulldogs timeout.  Brooklyn came out of the timeout with a 3-0 spurt to take a 24-22 lead leaving the Lady Bears one point away from losing the set.  Regulation wasn't enough as they went into a tiebreaker and St. Joseph's earned the victory scoring the last two points of the set after the score was tied at 26-26 to build a 1-0 margin.

Brooklyn jumped out to an early 7-4 lead in the second stanza  but the Lady Bears fought their way back scoring five unanswered to take a 9-7 lead and did not look back as they would not trail again to take the second set in the most lopsided period of the match.

St. Joseph's overwhelmed the Bulldogs to begin the set jumping out to a 16-10 lead and it looked like to would be a quick three set match. However, Brooklyn had other plans as they climbed their way back scoring five unanswered with the score 21-16 to tie up the set at 21-21. The two teams traded points with the second tiebreaker of the match coming to fruition after the Lady Bears tied the match at 24-24 on a Moran kill. St. Joseph's built a 30-29 lead and were  one point away from the sweep before the Bulldogs finished with three in a row to get back in the match at 2-1.

The fourth set saw Brooklyn try to use the momentum from their win in the previous set but the Lady Bears offensive attack proved too much as St. Joseph's led for most of the set taking a 22-16 lead late. However, the Bulldogs had one last run in them going on a 5-0 run to cut the Lady Bears lead to 22-21 with the possibility of a fifth set looming. St. Joseph's ended the suspense closing the set with two kills from Moran to earn the victory.

The Lady Bears conclude their 2013 campaign on Sunday, October 27th taking part in the HVIAC Tournament at The College of New Rochelle as the No. 1 seed. St. Joseph's will play No. 4 seed Pratt Institute in the semifinals at 2 p.m.