By Tim Foley, news staff
On Friday, the Northeastern women’s volleyball team returned home to play Hofstra University, losing the match in four sets.
Entering Friday’s match, the Huskies had lost nine consecutive sets, losing most recently to the University of Delaware. They came close to snapping that streak in the first set against Hofstra (24-4, 11-2 CAA), but to no avail. The Huskies played without sophomore libero Ashlee Asada, who missed the game due to an ankle injury.
Trailing 20-12 in the first set, the Huskies mounted a comeback, scoring six consecutive points. The lead began to slip away, but once again the Huskies reeled off a series of points, capitalizing on three Hofstra errors and landing two kills. However, with the score knotted at 23, Hofstra pulled away and won the set 25-23.
“The first set was a great comeback,” Head Coach Ken Nichols said. “Unfortunately, we came up a bit short.”
Sophomore setter Jamie Bredahl, who is still recovering from an ankle injury she sustained three weeks ago, did not start but subbed in halfway through the first set to contribute four points and three assists. Bredahl, who had been doing more hitting prior to the injury, said “it felt great” to set again.
Bredahl also said the injury wasn’t noticeable during the game.
“It actually felt really good during the match, but I was in pain after,” she said.
Early in the second set, the two teams exchanged points, but Hofstra began to build a lead. The Hofstra attack had19 kills in the set. While the Huskies managed nine kills, five of which came from freshman outside hitter Brigitte Burcescu, it was not enough to keep pace in the set, and they lost 25-19.
In the third set, the Huskies developed an early lead but allowed Hofstra to come back. Northeastern trailed 8-9 but scored the next five points to take a lead and maintained it for the rest of the set, eventually winning 25-17. Senior outside hitter Ava Cramp had three kills and a block in the set. Bredahl started the set and had five assists, and freshman setter Kristen Walding subbed in, adding four assists as well as three blocks.
Northeastern allowed Hofstra to take a 15-5 lead in the fourth set and struggled to narrow the gap, scoring only 12 points in the set. The Huskies lost the match 3-1, their fourth loss in a row.
Senior libero Natalia Skiba had 33 digs in the match – her highest total of digs since the first match of the conference season. Nichols called Skiba “one of the most remarkable players ever to don a uniform for Northeastern Volleyball.”
Bredahl said it is “a blessing” to get to play with Skiba and the other seniors. Skiba is just 15 digs shy of surpassing the 600 dig mark in a single season.
Freshman middle blocker Carmen Costa played in all four sets and landed her season-high six kills while posting a .333 hitting percentage. Costa also had her season-high three blocks.
“I was overall happy to be able to make a difference in terms of blocking,” Costa said, “Especially because Hofstra is offensively strong.”
Sophomore middle hitter Caterina Rosander had a season-high nine blocks against Hofstra. She leads the team with 88 blocks this season. While Bredahl’s role was limited against Hofstra, she led the team with 14 assists and also contributed five digs.
The Huskies will play home matches on Friday and Saturday against the College of William & Mary and James Madison University, respectively.
Photo courtesy Jim Pierce, Northeastern Athletics
