Elon Phoenix Volleyball Falls to Hofstra in Three Sets

HEMPSTEAD, N.Y. – Elon University volleyball battled throughout in its match Friday, Oct. 6, on the road against Hofstra inside the Mack Physical Education Center, but ultimately fell 3-0 (25-19, 25-14, 25-19) to the Pride.

FINAL STATS

“I loved the fight in our team tonight,” said Elon head coach Mary Tendler. “We had good execution for some stretches, but we just couldn’t sustain it for long enough periods of time against a very good Hofstra team. We will get back in the gym Saturday morning for practice before our final match of the weekend Sunday at Northeastern.”

The loss puts Elon’s overall record this season at 13-7. It also dropped to 2-3 in CAA play on the year. Hofstra improved to 12-7 on the campaign and 4-1 in conference action. Hofstra was picked to finish second in the CAA this year in the preseason poll and garnered three first-place votes.

THE RUNDOWN
The Phoenix opened the match by taking four of the first five points with kills by Elizabeth Coil and Nori Thomas. The start was also aided by two Pride attack errors. Hofstra made its way back and the two teams went back and forth with Elon eventually taking a 13-11 lead after back-to-back kills from Thomas, but the Pride answered with an 8-1 run that forced Elon to burn its timeouts while going down by as many as five at 19-14. From there, Hofstra closed out the set 25-19.

Early in the second set, the two teams traded points until Hofstra won four of five to take a 7-6 deficit to a 10-8 lead. After the Phoenix pulled back within a point at 10-9, the Pride went on a 5-0 run that it eventually extended to 7-1 to take a 17-10 lead. Elon used an attack error and a pair of kills from Courtney Carpenter and Sydney Busa to climb within four at 17-13, but Hofstra answered with four in a row to go back up by eight at 21-13 and never looked back from there on the way to a 25-14 win. In all, Hofstra went on a 17-6 run to close the set after it was tied at 8-8 early on.

The third set started with three kills by Busa, doubling her total from the first two sets, to earn the Phoenix its first points. Elon answered Hofstra taking a 7-4 lead with a 5-0 run to go up 9-7. After a Pride timeout, Hofstra won four of the next five points to lead 11-10, but the Phoenix came back and went up 16-14 with a 3-0 run behind an error and two Busa aces after the Pride took a 14-13 lead. But after Busa’s pair of aces, Hofstra went on an 8-0 run to take control of the set at 22-16. The two teams traded the last six points with Hofstra taking the win with the 25-19 set victory.

HIGHLIGHTS
Busa posted seven kills in the match with four of them coming in the third set alone. Kam Terry also added six kills with 10 digs and two blocks and Thomas added five kills. Maddie Jaudon led Elon with 11 digs and Kodi Garcia finished with 20 assists.

Laura Masciullo led all players with 15 kills and 11 digs for a double-double. Doris Bogoje added eight kills, three digs and five blocks. Sanne Maring and Hanna Russell also added five blocks apiece while Maring had seven kills. Luisa Sydlik finished with 34 assists in the match. Hofstra outblocked Elon 12-4 in the contest.

NOTES
-With Busa’s team-high seven kills, it’s the first time this season Elon has not had a hitter reach double-digit kills in a match.
-Busa is now seven kills away from Laura Griffin’s seventh-place 1,167 all-time kills. She is also 39 digs away from 1,000 in her career. She is looking to become the fourth player in program history with 1,000 kills and 1,000 digs in a career.
-Jaudon improved her career dig total to 1,224. She is now 40 behind Cheryl Spivey for sixth place on the program’s all-time list.

UP NEXT
The Phoenix will close a three-match road trip on Sunday afternoon, Oct. 8, with a 1 p.m. match against Northeastern inside the Cabot Center in Boston. Last year, both matches against the Huskies went five sets with each team winning at home.