SELINSGROVE, PA (October 29, 2022) – Susquehanna volleyball closed out their regular season schedule on Saturday with two matches as part of a Landmark Conference Quad-Match, serving as one of the two host sites for the final day of regular season for the conference. Susquehanna would face Goucher College at 11 am, putting on a dominant display and taking a 3-0 sweep over the Gophers with scores of 25-12, 25-9, and 25-15. The team also celebrated Senior Day prior to the first match, honoring their five senior players. They would then return to the court later in the day to face Elizabethtown College in a battle for the third seed in the Landmark Tournament and came out on the wrong end of a five-set endurance match, falling 3-2 with scores of 25-27, 25-18, 25-22, 17-25, and 11-15.
Match 1: Susquehanna 3, Goucher 0
The clear aggressors from the opening whistle, the River Hawks trailed only once, in the opening few points of the third set, enroute to an efficient sweep of the Gophers. Highlighted by a second set performance that saw them tally fifteen kills with zero attacking errors and a remarkable .750 team hitting percentage, the River Hawks controlled every statistical category. Their efficient hitting saw them finish with a heady .404 team hitting percentage, compared to a .000 for Goucher, while tallying 45 kills to Goucher's 17, 11 aces to their two, eight blocks to their 1, 41 assists to their 17, and 42 digs to their 38.
Fifth-year Kody Dillon had a field day from her position in the middle, racking up a season-high 14 kills to lead the team and doing so on a stellar .619 hitting percentage. She also added two blocks, an assist, and a dig. Her fellow middle, sophomore Amanda Gore, had a strong match of her own, putting up eight kills on just thirteen attempts with zero hitting errors, putting up a .615 hitting percentage just shy of Dillon's. She also led the team with six total blocks. Rosina Esposito came just shy of a double-double performance, tallying 11 kills and nine digs, hitting .370 as the lead attacker and adding two assists and a block as well. Emily Kyle also put up a career-high serving performance in her Senior Day match, having six service aces in the match, the highest single- game total for any River Hawk all season.
Match 2: Elizabethtown 3, Susquehanna 2
Both teams knew the stakes in the final match of the day, and the quality lived up to the billing as the two teams took five sets to battle it out for the third seed, all being closely fought. The first set would encapsulate the match as a whole, taking extra points to satisfy the requisite two-point led above 25 to settle the set in Elizabethtown's favor. SU led for much of the match, leading by as many as six points in the set and propelled by 13 kills while the Blue Jays committed nine attack errors, a match-high in a set, to allow the River Hawks to keep an advantage. But, down 18-12, Elizabethtown would string together three separate three-point runs over the next 16 points to put themselves in the lead at 25-24. SU would tie it at 25 with a kill from Esposito, but the next two kills went to Elizabethtown to give them the one-set advantage.
Despite the early setback, Susquehanna rebounded well in the second set, producing 17 kills on a .250 team hitting percentage and riding strong performances in the set from Dillon and Ryan Rorls to stay out in front for the remainder of the set after a tied 6-6 scoreline. Rorls had five kills while Dillon tallied three. The third set was closer in comparison, with the squads swapping the lead eight times before Susquehanna went on a four-point run down 16-15 and held the lead from there, with Dillon accounting for the final four points in the set for Susquehanna through three kills and a block.
Now leading two sets to one, Susquehanna would fall onto the back foot in the fourth set, seeing a five-point run from the Blue Jays put them behind early. They battled to stay close, but with the score 17-15 in Elizabethtown's favor, the Blue Jays unleashed a devastating seven-point run to reach set point and leave SU needing to score ten-straight points just to break set point. The River Hawks managed two, with Rorls putting up back-to-back kills, but the comeback effort went no further, and Elizabethtown claimed the set to tie the teams at two apiece and force a fifth set tiebreaker.
It would again be a slow start that proved to undo the River Hawks in the fifth set, as a three-point run for E-Town at the beginning made a difference at the end, as Susquehanna never managed to fully close that gap, coming within one point of tying the score on six different occasions but remaining just behind. Down 11-10, some strong offensive play saw Elizabethtown score four of the next five points to take the set 15-11 and win the match 3-2.
While the final score will prove a tough pill to swallow for SU, they'll take solace in some strong statistical performances. Esposito had a hefty 21 kills to lead the way for SU, adding 15 digs to secure a double-double. She also had three blocks, three assists, and a service ace to account for 23.5 points on her own. Two other River Hawks had double-digit kill totals, with Rorls putting up 17, a career-high for the sophomore. Dillon would be the other, rounding out a stellar individual day with 13 kills on a team-leading .440 hitting percentage and adding five total blocks. Dillon finishes the regular season as the Landmark Conference leader in blocks with 97 total, 13 ahead of the next closest total. Another career-high came in the assist total for sophomore Keira Roach, who racked up 50 in the match. First-year Jessica Sack continued her strong run of form after returning to the libero position a few matches ago, leading the team with 27 digs and two service aces, also adding the second highest assist total with five.
Resigned to the fourth seed in the conference tournament by the defeat, the River Hawks will now gear up for a potential revenge tour in the tournament, with their three conference losses having come against the three other playoff teams. They'll begin with a semifinal matchup on the road at number 1 seed Juniata, who also are currently 2nd-ranked in the AVCA Top 25 and dealt the River Hawks a 3-0 loss in their Landmark opener earlier in the season. No stranger to big time matchups against Juniata, Susquehanna's sole victory over the Eagles came in Huntingdon when they beat them 3-2 in 2019 to claim the first seed in the Landmark that year and deal Juniata what was only their second loss ever in Landmark Conference play. This coming match will take place on Wednesday, November 2 at 7 pm. The winner will face the winner of Scranton vs. Elizabethtown in the Landmark Conference Championship.
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