ST. DAVIDS, Pa.– Eastern University Men's Volleyball closed out the home schedule with a three-set win over Wilkes.
Darren Lopez had ten kills, ten digs, and six aces and Nick Hulbert finished with 10 kills.
How It Happened:
The Eagles took advantage of early miscues from the visitors and hit .273 in the opening set on the way to a 25-16 win. Hulbert had four kills and Wilkes had five serving errors in the opening frame.
In the second set, the Colonels reduced the serving errors by serving less aggressively, and the Eagles capitalized with 13 kills. Lopez had six terminations in the set. Eastern scored six of the final eight points of the set to win 25-20.
Wilkes hit .333 in the third set, but Lopez had four aces and the Eagles had seven total aces in the third. Eastern built a 22-13 lead before a series of Wilkes' blocks and Eastern errors allowed the guests to pull to within two points at 23-21.
Anthony Smith found a spot for a 24-21 lead and Lopez ended the match with a big jump serve.
Eastern lost in four sets at Wilkes earlier in the year. The Eagles (7-10, 3-10 MAC) were successful on 67 percent of their side-out opportunities in the match.
Coach Syracuse Says:
"Hard work pays off and it showed tonight. We've been working on our outside attack and our defense recently, and we saw success in both areas tonight."
"Individually, Kirium Yordan playing in place of the injured Gabe Perez provided a great spark with some timely kills and several blocks. He really has taken advantage of his opportunities to help the team. I think the team fed off his energy and success. Darren Lopez is doing a terrific job of reading the place while on defense as a result he had several spectacular digs that led to transition opportunities. Bruno Vargas passed well and allowed Cameron to create ample opportunities for our hitters to be successful."
"A renewed attitude toward serving paid dividends tonight. We had a good number of aces with relatively few misses. We kept Wilkes from being able to capitalize on their strong middle attack. All in all it was a terrific team effort and victory"
Up Next:
The Eagles wrap up their season at Stevenson on Saturday night.
