Women's Volleyball Defeats Ithaca, Hoists The Cayuga Cup

ITHACA, N.Y. – For the first time in team history, the Wells College women's volleyball team posted a 3-2 road victory over the Bombers of Ithaca College on Wednesday. With the victory, the Express will take home the Cayuga Cup, a newly-created trophy that is awarded to the winner of the yearly match between the Cayuga Lake rivals.

Wells, who won in five sets via scores of 25-23, 22-25, 25-19, 23-25 and 15-7, picks up their first victory in four matches against Ithaca dating back to the 2012 season, the first year of modern-day volleyball in Aurora. The Express are in the midst of their best season in team history, boasting a 19-9 overall record after claiming a victory against a 20-win program (20-8) for the first time.

With 23 kills on the match, sophomore Meredith Kadjeski (Mechanicsburg, Pa.) was selected as the Cayuga Cup Most Valuable Player after tying her own all-time single-match program record for kills. Freshman Anuhea Leite-Ah Yo (Hilo, Hawaii) contributed 24 digs defensively for the Express, setting the single-match high for the program. Senior Taryn Heath (Truxton, N.Y.) also tied her own program record with 49 assists.

Junior Vashti Nettles (Long Beach, Calif.) set a career-high mark with eight digs against the Bombers. She also chipped in 15 kills to rank second on the squad in that category. Senior Jessilyn Artaho-Aki (Kapa'a, Hawaii) registered 17 digs on defense while Heath and freshman Olyvia Brazier (Stony Brook, N.Y.) tallied dig totals of 14 and 13, respectively.

The Express opened up a 5-1 lead in the first set and ultimately built an 11-3 lead with Kadjeski serving. Leading by a 19-9 margin, however, an Ithaca timeout set up an 11-to-2 run for the host Bombers as they rallied to take a 21-20 lead. Wells, however, settled down after a time out and saw a kill from Leite-Ah Yo that preceded three-straight kills from Kadjeski to take the opening set.

With the score tied at 16 aside in the second set, a Carly Garone kill for Ithaca preceded back-to-back kills from Dylan Gawinski-Stern to elevate the home team to a 19-16 lead. Down by a 24-19 score, the Express rallied and used a Kadjeski kill and back-to-back Ithaca errors to shrink the deficit but a Joelle Goldstein kill, set up by Kayla Gromen, evened the match at one.

Wells opened up an 8-2 lead in the third set that they would not relinquish. The Express utilized three service aces in the set's first 10 points to build the convincing lead. Leading 20-18, the Express wrapped up the set after scoring five of the set's final six points down the stretch to force a fourth set.

Despite a rocky ending to the fourth set, Ithaca was ultimately able to come away with the set victory to force a decisive fifth set. Despite a match-high eight attacking errors in the fourth set alone, the Bombers found themselves up 24-20 but giving away points to the Express via an attacking error and back-to-back ball handling errors. A Katie Hartman kill, set up by Gromen, ultimately forced the fifth set after the final point came immediately following a time out by Ithaca.

With the score tied at two aside in set five, the Ithaca offense imploded and committed four-straight attacking errors to grant Wells a 6-2 lead. In total, the Bombers committed seven attacking errors to account for a large portion of Wells' 15 team points. Brazier hammered home an attacking error to set the score at 14-6 and the Express ultimately won the fifth set 15-7 after an Ithaca attacking error.

The Bombers were led by Goldstein's 19 kills on offense. Gromen set up 44 of her team's 50 points while Myan Idziur picked up a team-leading 18 digs defensively. Ithaca outblocked the Express across the five set match, registering 12 block assists on the evening.

Wells returns to action Saturday, Oct. 25 as they face-off against the host team from the University of Scranton at 11 a.m. before playing Rutgers-Camden in a 1 p.m. match.