Box Score NEWARK, NJ—NJIT, playing its best stretch since the Eastern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association league slate began in early February, swept visiting Saint Francis, 3-0 (25-21, 25-21, 25-16), Friday afternoon in EIVA action in the Estelle and Zoom Fleisher Athletic Center.
Friday's win, which came on the heels of a 3-2 win last Saturday over two-time defending NCAA Division III National Champion Springfield, boosts NJIT's overall record to 10-15 and its record in the EIVA to 3-10. The match was the last of 2014 for Saint Francis, which finishes 11-15 overall and 6-8 in the EIVA.
One of those EIVA wins for the Red Flash was a come-from-behind 3-2 win at home against the Highlanders on February 15 in Loretto, PA. If nothing else, that result helped set a tone that has plagued much of the 2014 EIVA season for NJIT, which was 7-5 outside the East's top men's volleyball circuit.
Before EIVA play began, NJIT fashioned a 4-1 record. The EIVA slate began at Sacred Heart and NJIT lost the first two sets before rallying to take the next two sets. Sacred Heart prevailed in the fifth set to win the match. But the disappointed Highlanders could take some solace, having rallied back from the brink of a sweep to force the maximum five sets.
The following weekend came the annual EIVA trip to central Pennsylvania, where the Highlanders fell at Penn State, 3-0. But there was no real surprise there. Penn State has won the last 15 consecutive EIVA titles, have dropped just 11 EIVA regular season matches in the EIVA and its predecessor, the Eastern Collegiate Volleyball League, going all the way back to 1986. That's 11 regular season losses, total, in 29 seasons.
The next night in Loretto, PA, the Highlanders took the first two close sets, but lost in the third, 21-25. In the fourth set, they built an 18-14 lead, but the Red Flash finished the set on an 11-3 run for another 25-21 victory. In the fifth set, played to 15 points, NJIT led 7-5, but Saint Francis ripped off a 10-2 closeout to win 15-9 and take the match.
NJIT was swept in its next three league contests to fall to 0-6 in the EIVA before taking a pair of league matches, including a 3-2 payback victory over Sacred Heart.
The Highlanders went away for seven straight matches, losing six. But they began showing positive signs in back-to-back competitive 1-3 EIVA losses against George Mason (April 5) and Harvard (April 11), both of which have qualified for the four-team 2014 EIVA postseason tournament to be played later this month. After that came the win over Springfield, the DIII National Champs also ranked atop the 2014 national DIII poll.
Against that background, the Highlanders swept their rematch against Saint Francis, taking each of the first two sets by 25-21 counts and then blowing out the visitors in the clinching third set, 25-16.
NJIT had two players with double-figure kills totals, paced by redshirt sophomore
TJ Jurko, who finished with 12 kills, and
Kajetan Borecki, who knocked down 10 kills, giving him double-figures in that category for a fourth-straight match. Just missing out on being a third hitter in double-figures, middle
Ryan Thomas notched 9 kills and had just one error in 11 swings for a big .727 hitting percentage.
Jurko, too, was efficient, posting a .417 attack percentage, while
Chris Kaepernick was at .571 (4 k, 0 e, 7 ta) and freshman
Dylan Lavner, making his second career match start, was at .667 (2 k. 0 e, 3 ta). Overall. NJIT was at an attack percentage of .413 (38 kills, 7 errors, 75 total attempts). The .413 was NJIT's best in its 13 EIVA contests to date and second overall only to its .439 vs. non-conference New Jersey City University.
Zak Robben collected a match-best 30 assists at setter for the Highlanders, who also dominated the serving game, notching eight aces to two for the visitors. Jurko and Kaepernick each served three aces to pace NJIT.
On defense, junior libero
Oren Zyndorf had 15 digs for NJIT, more than twice the total posted by the next-highest floor defender in the match (6 for Saint Francis leader Kyle Beatty).
The Highlanders, who had a 6.0-to-3.0 lead in total team blocks, were led individually by Thomas' four (1 solo, 3 assisted). Jurko added two block assists and a block solo for the winners.
Beatty, a redshirt senior outside hitter for Saint Francis, led the visitors' attack with a match-best 13 kills, but no one else had more than 7 (Mike Marshman) for the Red Flash.
Michael Krepp paced Saint Francis with 22 assists, while Beatty and Mike Delyser, each with one ace, accounted for their team's pair of aces.
As noted earlier, Beatty had a team-best 6 digs and Marshman and Colin Sherwin each had two block assists to top their team in that department.
NJIT opened the match with leads of 4-1, 6-2, and 8-3, but the visitors fought to tie three more times, the latest at 16-16, before the Highlanders ran off three in a row, on a Borecki kill and ace and then a Red Flash attack error. However, NJIT wasn't out of the woods, and the Red Flash trailed just 20-21 after Marshman and Logan Patterson combined on a block.
However, Jurko delivered a kill and then combined with Thomas for a block, pushing the lead to 23-20. Beatty got what would be his team's last point of the set before Jurko nailed down the win with two more kills back-to-back.
The Highlanders played a lot of the second set from behind and trailed 13-16 before flipping the 3-point deficit to a 3-point lead, 20-17, with a 7-1 run, as Jurko added two more kills and Kaepernick and Lavner each served aces in the spurt. Saint Francis later got within two, but a Red Flash service error settled the set in favor of NJIT, 25-21.
The third set was tied as late as 6-6, but a Saint Francis service error, followed by consecutive aces for Kaepernick and a kill for Borecki put NJIT ahead for good, 10-6. The Highlanders gradually expanded their lead to 19-13 and then, after a Red Flash point, closed out the set on a 6-2 tear that included two kills, a block and the capper, a service ace for match point, all for Jurko.
NJIT wraps up the season with a 3 pm home match Saturday against Penn State in the Fleisher Athletic Center.
By its own amazing dynastic standards, Penn State has not had one of its greatest seasons, having lost once in the EIVA regular season and six times overall. But the Nittany Lions are 12th in the latest American Volleyball Coaches Association national Division I-II poll. And Penn State has clinched first place and the top seed in the EIVA postseason tournament, which it will host next weekend. The EIVA tournament winner will advance automatically to the six-team NCAA national championship field.
