By: Katlyn Gambill, News Correspondent
The Northeastern women’s volleyball team saw their eight-game pre-season winning streak end last Saturday against the Hofstra Pride after winning the first two sets of the match.
The five-set game was the first CAA game of the season for both teams. After storming back and winning the first set 25-23 and then dominating in the second 25-18, the Huskies dropped the final sets with scores of 21-25, 22-25 and 9-15. Last year the Huskies defeated the Pride twice.
“I think as a team, even though we were losing, everybody was coming together,” said sophomore middle hitter Nichole Kurz. Kurz was second on the Huskies with 12 kills.
Outside hitter Janelle Tucker, led both teams with 16 kills, and added eight digs and three blocks. Sophomore Kurz had three service aces and tied junior Nicole Bishop for the team lead of blocks, with six.
Sophomore setter Ina Kamenova registered 21 assists, while freshman outside hitter Jillian Briner scored 20 assists.
Hofstra may have jumped out to a head start in the first set, but the Huskies managed to battle back. After giving up an 8-4 run, the Huskies called a timeout.
“We were playing so flustered, trying to out-muscle them,” head coach Ken Nichols said.
The timeout helped as the Huskies won the next three points to cut the lead to 20-18 after capitalizing on a Kurz kill, a Kamenova ace and a Hofstra error. Northeastern went on a run at the end of the set to win the last six points.
The roster of 14 took an early lead in the second set before Hofstra nearly caught up. The Huskies managed to get to 14-9 after Tucker registered her second kill of the set while junior Jasmine Marta and Kurz added a kill each. Kurz started out the third set with an ace and the Huskies led 3-1. Yet the Pride went on a 4-1 run after that to gain the lead.
“We were making them look good, we were making mistakes but they were also playing really good defense,” Kurz said. “They were doing everything right on their side and at the same time we were making mistakes that were making them look good.”
Kurz said what the Huskies can learn from this loss is that they have to bring their full effort or they are not going to win. Despite the good start to the third set, the Huskies faltered as the Pride went on a three-point run to lead 14-9. Nichols called another timeout which was to no avail, as the Pride built a six-point lead.
“Nicole Bishop’s favorite word, we need more energy. We definitely need to bring more energy in the next games,” Kurz said.
She had a kill and two service aces to give the Huskies the first three points of the fourth set.
“Our coach always says, get off the bus, wake up when you’re out there,” she said.
The Pride gave up three attacking errors in the beginning of the fifth set, but bounced back with a seven-point run. Nichols said one thing his team has done all season was keep other teams from going on long point streaks, but they failed to do so in this game.
Winning four of the last six points, the Pride put away the five set to win the match. They improved to 33-7 all time against Northeastern.
Looking to bounce back after a conference loss, the Huskies host rivals Delaware and Towson 7 p.m. Friday and 1 p.m. Sunday respectively.
“We’re definitely hungry for a win,” Kurz said.
