Women's Volleyball bounces back, knocks off New Haven

WALTHAM, Massachusetts – The American International College women's volleyball team defeated the University of New Haven in a four-set match, 22-25, 25-23, 25-10, 26-24, on Saturday, September 9. 

AIC is now 2-5 on the season. 

Both teams swung well in the first set. The Yellow Jackets scored 18 kills, a match high, but the Chargers were able to edge out AIC for the win with a .500 attack percentage, and the key was a stretch of eight out of 11 points from when the score was 13-13.

New Haven had early control of the second set after a Macy Brown kill made it 13-7, but Matt Cribbin moved Alice Di Francesco into the match to set and it paid dividends as AIC quickly went on a seven-point run. Ultimately, Janelys Perez Cortes slammed down the last shot in the set to tie the match at 1-1.

In the third, AIC tore the court up, scoring the first 11 points, and built to a 17-2 lead; Paola Soto Burgos notched five kills in the run while Aleksandra Ivanovic landed four, with both contributing a block as well. Ivanovic had a hand on the final point of the set as well, stopping Brown for the 25-10 win.

The Chargers, facing defeat, jumped to a 5-1 lead early on in the fourth, but AIC hung around. New Haven could not put it away despite a 23-21 lead, and the teams pushed past regulation in the set at 24-24. After Perez Cortes gave AIC set point, Ivanovic and Di Francesco ended things, blocking another Brown bid to seal the win.

For Cribbin, the victory represented a milestone: 200 wins as the head coach of the Yellow Jackets. He is the second coach to reach the milestone for the program, and trails only the legendary Judy Groff among wins in program history.

Perez Cortez led AIC with 15 kills, while Soto Burgos collected 14, Ivanovic 12, Kristina Peric 11, and Amber Williams nine. Ivanovic collected six blocks, with Soto Burgos adding five, while Peric led the team with 19 digs. Di Francesco racked up 32 assists in two and a half sets after Victoria Mendez notched 17 in the first set and a half.

The Yellow Jackets return to the Butova Gym for the first time in 2023 as they host the 2023 International Volleyball Hall of Fame East Region Clash on September 15-16.