CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- The Mount Holyoke College volleyball team fell 3-0 at No. 16 nationally ranked MIT, then evened out the day with a 3-0 win over Worcester State on Saturday afternoon in Rockwell Cage.
Mount Holyoke (9-7, 1-3 NEWMAC) returns home to face Clark University in a NEWMAC match on Tuesday at 7pm.
MIT 3, Mount Holyoke 0 (BOX)
The host Engineers (13-3, 4-0 NEWMAC) fully controlled their NEWMAC matchup with the visiting Lyons, winning 25-9, 25-12, 25-13, with only one lead change in the match. MIT attacked at a .446 rate as a team, with only two attack errors.
Ella Zhou led a potent attack with eight kills on 15 attempts, while Jessie Trapp, Claire Underwood, Ali Gibbs, and Eileen Sadati had seven kills apiece for the hosts.
Mount Holyoke senior Elle Rimando (Mililani, Hawaii) led the Lyons with eight kills in the match, and junior Kyra Staples (Chatham, Ill.) had a match-high 18 digs. Senior Madeline Barton (Brookfield, Wis.) had six kills and sophomore Olivia Murray (Miami, Fla.) had four.
First-year Mia Sproge (Baltimore, Md.) started at setter for Mount Holyoke and tallied 17 assists.
Mount Holyoke 3, Worcester St. 0 (BOX)
The Lyons prevailed in three evenly played sets over the Lancers (4-13) for their ninth victory of the year.
Mount Holyoke led nearly throughout the first set, but Worcester State came back from 21-14 down to within a point (21-20).
The second set featured 16 ties and 10 lead changes. The Lyons trailed 25-24, but got a kill by Rimando and finished out the set with a 4-1 run featuring a block by senior Sadie Duffrin (Minneapolis, Minn.) and sophomore Sonja Gray (Sharon, Mass.), and for the clinching two points, kills by Murray and Barton.
Mount Holyoke trailed 17-16 in the third set and ended it with a 9-3 run, punctuated by first-year Elanni Romero's (Nashua, N.H.) third service ace and Barton's 14th kill.
Barton put down 14 kills with four aces, Rimando had 10 kills, and Murray added seven for the Lyons, who won despite a slight (.171 to .134) disadvantage in attack percentage. Duffrin (18 assists) and Sproge (12 assists) split setting duties.
