Men's Volleyball wraps up regular season with GNAC sweep

(Boston, MA) This weekend the Men's Volleyball team traveled to Brown-Plofker Gym in Boston where they swept both Emerson College and Mount Ida College to finish the regular season with a perfect 14-0 Great Northeast Athletic Conference (GNAC) record. The #16 ranked Raiders have earned the #1 overall seed in the GNAC playoffs as well as a bye in the first round. The five-time defending champions will face the victor of the match-up between #4 Johnson & Wales and #5 Lasell on April 11th at the Muldoon Gymnasium.

Match One: Rivier University 3, Emerson College 0

The Raiders swept the host Emerson College Lions in straight sets 26-24, 25-11, and 25-21. The Lions put up a fight in the first set as the two teams would exchange points until the Raiders pulled out the two point victory. Neither team would lead in the match by more than three points in the first set. The Raiders took care of business over the next two sets to improve to 23-11 overall.

The Raider offensive attack was led by juniors Aaron Almario (Alhambra, CA) and Terrence Matatall (Danville, NH) both with 11 kills. Almario had three digs in the match and Matatall had five block assists. The two led a group of six Raiders with multiple kills; sophomores Chris Markuson (Cupertino, CA), Shane Spellman (Norwich, CT) and Sam Kazlas (Allentown, PA) had nine, six and two kills respectively. Senior Steve Visentin (Cheshire, CT) also had two kills while he paced the Raider offense with 36 assists in the match. Junior Matt Bynon (Burnt Hills, NY) and Spellman had six digs apiece for Rivier in the victory.

For the Lions Alex Frapech led the team with 11 kills and six digs. Brendan McGonigle led Emerson with 19 assists while contributing three kills and three digs in the losing effort. With the loss Emerson fell to 10-16 overall and 4-9 in the GNAC. They will return to action as the #6 seed in the GNAC playoffs and will face the #3 seed Wentworth Institute of Technology.

Match Two: Rivier University 3, Mount Ida College 0

Closing out the season the Raiders swept the Mount Ida Mustangs in straight sets, 25-11, 25-14, and 25-15. The Raiders easily defeated the Mustangs with a new look offense that earned the victory with a collective team effort. In the match there were six Raiders with multiple kills and six more with multiple digs. As a team the Raiders averaged a .452 hitting percentage, 10 service aces, and 12 block assists. With the victory the Raiders improved to 24-11 overall and a perfect 14-0 in the GNAC.

The Tutino brothers (Brendan and Matt) out of Manorville, NY led the Raider offense with nine and eight kills respectively. Other Raiders collecting multiple kills in the match were sophomore Cam Phegley-Walker (Los Angeles, CA) with six, freshman Kegan Moody (Cranston, RI) with five and his classmates Kevin Baran-Maguire (Newport Beach, CA) and Mike Hadder (Yucaipa, CA) with three and two kills apiece. A trio of Raiders combined to dish out 28 of the teams 32 assists. Visentin led the pack with 10 assists while Spellman and Hadder had nine each. Brendan Tutino led the Raiders defense with six digs while Hadder collected four. Freshman Nick Ochoa (Whittier, CA) and Phegley-Walker each had three digs.

As a team the Mustangs collected only 11 kills on their way to a -.150 kill percentage in the loss. Spencer Hastings led Mount Idea with four of their 11 kills. Brady Rodriguez assisted on eight kills and tied for the team lead two digs in the match. With the loss the Mustangs fell to 6-20 on the season and 2-11 in conference play.

Conference Stat Leaders

After posting a perfect 14-0 record in the GNAC, the Raiders proved to be completely dominant by leading the conference in multiple individual stat categories. Chris Markuson led the GNAC with 347 kills, 18 more than the next leading player. Markuson was also third in kills per set with 3.37. Matt Bynon narrowly led the conference with 262 digs. Aaron Almario led the conference with 1.17 blocks per set while teammate Terrence Matatall was third with 1.06 blocks per set. Matatall was also third in the GNAC with a .372 hitting percentage followed by Almario who posted a .386. Finally Steve Visentin dominated the conference averaging just over 10 assists per set.