PRINCESS ANNE, Maryland – The University of Maryland Eastern Shore volleyball team was all gas and no brakes against visiting Manhattan College on Saturday (September 3) for the final match of the Henson Hawk Invitational. In resounding fashion, the Hawks swept the Jaspers in three straight sets 25-11, 25-12, 25-19 to notch their second victory of the season.
Derionah Abner was named as the All-Tournament recipient for the Hawks.
It was a good start for the Hawks from the first set, getting a point right off the bat due to a Jasper service error and never trailing for the rest of the match. The attack was well rounded in the set with Abner,
Ranyla Griggs and
Soleil Cotton each grabbing three kills – Griggs also had three digs and a service ace.
"We talked after the Hampton match that making sure in the first set that we are coming out and establishing ourselves as the aggressor," Callarman said. "Nyla did that for us today – the first four (set ups) were big swings, she was playing aggressive, she was playing really brave and that's probably our motto moving forward and Nyla really brought that – playing brave."
Two seven-point runs for the Hawks kept the second out of the grasp of the Jaspers, starting with one to begin the set with
Sophia Chacon serving, grabbing two assists and an ace in the process. With the score 13-7,
Romina Vacca was subbed in and started a second seven-point rally to have the Hawks more than doubled up on Manhattan before a ball handling error ended the set.
"We got better at the service line, that was nice to see," Callarman said. "We had higher quality serves, which was something we weren't great at the night before. If there's anything we moved the needle on from day one to day two, was we just were a little more focused at the service line."
With the two-set lead heading into the third, Maryland Eastern Shore kept the game close with the Jaspers, baiting them into believing they could get back into things, only for the Hawks to pull away after a timeout at 13-9 by Callarman. Following the timeout, the Hawks found their footing to control the rest of the set, refusing to let the Jaspers get more than two points in a row to maintain the lead and seal the win.
"We played to win, which is nice, the only downside of that is it's contingent on the other opponent and we kind of measured how hard we had to play to get the win," Callarman said. "That's not how you want to play. You want to play to be great, you want to play to your standard, no matter who's on the other side of the net."
Leading the Hawks in kills were
Nkemjika Ikemefuna and Abner with seven each, Chacon had 17 assists,
Valeria Matias was tops on the team with three aces and seven digs, and
Charlize Williams and
Yazmyn Stewart had a block each.
"Kemy (Nkemjika) is a weapon," Callarman said. "No one has an answer for Kemy. It's so nice having her when she's in, if we don't have a good passer we can just throw a high ball up to her and she'll do something for us – it just really helps the power of our offense."
The Hawks are back in action next weekend at the William & Mary Tournament where they will take on the hosts on Friday (September 9) at 5 p.m. and Radford on Saturday (September 10) at 10 a.m., with the William & Mary game being streamed live on FloSports.
Follow the action on Twitter via @ESHawksVB.
