Box Score
NEWARK, NJ—The NJIT women's volleyball team made a triumphant return to the Estelle and Zoom Fleisher Athletic Center, defeating Lehigh, 3-1, Tuesday night for the Highlanders eighth consecutive victory.
The Highlanders, who are 11-7 overall and have won nine of their last 10, won all of their previous matches in the winning streak on the road. Back home, they posted a 25-22, 25-21, 18-25, 25-14 win Tuesday night.
Three Highlanders registered double-figure kills totals, paced by senior Agnieszka Pregowska, with 13. Kristy Haeckel and Renata Pandolfo added 11 kills apiece. Pregowska (.346) and Haeckel (.391) each had high attack percentages.
Junior Erica Schultz finished with a match-best 32 assists for the Highlanders, who are closing in on their wins total from all of 2007, when they finished 13-24 in their second season of Division I competition.
NJIT had a decided serving advantage, with 10 aces to five for the visiting Mountain Hawks. Sabrina Baby led the way in that category, with three, while Pandolfo and Audrey Snell each notched two aces.
Pandolfo, an all-around star in this, her freshman season, picked up a match-high 20 digs to lead three players with double-figure totals in that category. Baby followed with 18 digs and Katrina Hornstein added 11 for the winners. Pregowska, the NJIT senior, had three block assists to lead the defense at the net.
Lehigh's Angelika Kopacz led all players with 19 kills, while Jessica Kudirka (19 assists) and Brittany Dickinson (15) shared setting duties for the Mountain Hawks. Mo McReynolds led the Lehigh servers with two aces.
Emma Melendez (15), Brittany Thurston (14) and Kopacz (12) all reached double figures in digs for Lehigh. Chelsea Sheridan, Rebecca Siegers and Kristin Musbach all had three block assists for the Mountain Hawks.
NJIT, which had won every set—19 in a row—starting with the last two sets in a come-from-behind 3-2 win over Akron on September 20, finally dropped a set when the Mountain Hawks took the third frame Tuesday night, 25-18.
Trailing in the set as much as 8-22, NJIT fought back with a 10-2 rally that proved to be too little, too late.
Having finally seen their run of successful sets end, the Highlanders rolled in the fourth frame to close out the match. They hit an overwhelming .406 in the set, with 15 kills and just two errors on 32 swings. Haeckel dominated the middle, notching four kills in eight attempts without an error, plus a block solo. Pregowska had three kills in just four tries and freshman Juliana Araujo added three kills, as well.
The fourth set was tied at 10 before NJIT won 15 of the next 19 points for the 25-14 win.
Tuesday's match was the first women's volleyball meeting between the schools.
The Highlanders will be back in action quickly, hosting Army Wednesday night in the Fleisher Athletic Center, with first serve scheduled for 7 pm. The Black Knights will be a formidable foe, having piled up a 15-2 overall record to date, with one of the losses coming against Southern California, which was ranked fifth in the nation when it topped Army, 3-0, on September 19 in a match that was televised on national cable.
Last year, Army finished 24-5 and defeated the Highlanders, 3-1, on August 28 in West Point, NY.
