Nethersole’s effort wasn’t enough for Hartford against the Friars. Courtesy of HartfordHawks.com

This past Sunday, the Volleyball team took on Providence College in its league-opening match. The Hawks would drop in three straight sets, with scores of 25-17, 25-20 and 25-21.

The Friars improve to 8-9 on the season with a 1-0 record in the America East, while Hartford drops to 6-11 on the season and are still looking for their first conference win.

Providence had the lead most of the way in the first set, ending with a 25-17 set win. Freshman Kayla Fitzgerald led the Friars with four kills in the set. The Friars combined for a .333 hitting percentage.

The second set started off back-and-forth with the Friars taking the advantage at the 14-13 mark. Providence then went on to take the 25-20 set victory. Junior Mackenzie Ziegler led the team in kills with four.

Providence picked up the sweep match victory in the third set (25-21). The Friars used four blocks in the set to aid their win. Fitzgerald notched five kills in the set and freshman Michelle Cruz recorded seven digs.

Overall, Providence was led by Fitzgerald with 11 kills. Sophomore Jordan Wiesler contributed 33 assists and Cruz had a game-best 19 digs.

Junior outside hitter Sareeta Nethersole led all players in the match finishing with 16 kills while the leading player for Providence was Fitzgerald, who finished with 11.

Also posting 8 kills for the day, was Maya Louis and teammates Lindsay Anderson and Corinne Horanzy both finished with 6 and 5 kills, respectively.

Overall the Hartford Hawks finished the match with 41 kills to 125 attempts (accounting for 22 errors) for an average of .152 for the day.

Jackie Tamburri led not only all the setters in the match with 36 out of 39 total Hartford assists, but also led the Hartford Hawks’ defense with 14 digs.

The defense provided a solid effort with Paola Llerandi, Sareeta Nethersole and Dionna Kirton adding 12, 11, and 10 digs, respectively.

They will get that chance taking on two worthy teams at home this coming week.

The Hartford Hawks Volleyball Team looks to improve their Conference record next with a pair of two exciting match ups which begin this coming Friday, Oct. 4, at 7 p.m. against the Albany Great Danes.

The Albany Great Danes is the team to beat according to a vote from a league of head coaches pegging them as the next America East Champions.

Albany is coming off a clean sweep of the reigning league champions of Binghamton, who then face the Hawks a few days later.