SOUTH HADLEY, Mass. -- No. 5 nationally ranked MIT remained undefeated Saturday with a 3-0 (25-13, 25-19, 25-22) victory over the Mount Holyoke College volleyball team in a NEWMAC match at Mildred S. Howard Gymnasium.
The visiting Engineers (16-0, 4-0 NEWMAC) cruised through the first two sets, attacking at a .273 rate in the first set and .220 in the second while holding the Lyons (8-6, 0-4 NEWMAC) to .008 and -.062 rates, respectively.
The third set featured 15 tie scores and eight lead changes. At 22-22, the Engineers reeled off three straight points to clinch the victory, getting kills from Elise Echarte and Julia Tolstova and an attack error by the Lyons on match point.
MIT played 19 players, with only three seeing the court in all three sets. Tolstova led MIT with eight kills and Ali Gibbs added seven to go with five blocks. At the setter position, Jullian Amaro had 11 assists, while Kayleigh May and Emery Fertic had nine apiece. Libero Ottavia Personeni posted a match-high 21 digs.
Senior Lucie Berclaz (Hull, Mass.) had seven kills on 31 attempts (.097) and junior Madeline Barton (Brookfield, Wis.) had seven kills on 39 attempts (.000) to go with three blocks for Mount Holyoke. Junior Sadie Duffrin (Minneapolis, Minn.) had a match-high 21 assists.
Four Lyons were in double figures in digs, led by sophomore Kyra Staples (Chatham, Ill.) with 18. Junior Amelia Ringor (Lafayette, Ind.) had 13 digs and Barton and Berclaz had 11 apiece.
Mount Holyoke will next host the University of Hartford on Friday at 6pm in the teams' first-ever meeting.
