Pair Of Five-Set Matches In Men's Volleyball Split

The Wells College men's volleyball team battled through a pair of five-set matches Saturday, Feb. 23 hosted at Rivier University in Nashua, N.H. In the opening match, Wells took the top-ranked team in the nation, Springfield College, to the brink but fell in five sets. Wells responded with a five-set victory over Rivier.

The Express is 10-6 overall and will play a midweek match at Daemen College on Tuesday, Feb. 26 at 7 p.m. Next weekend, Wells hosts a six-team tournament at the Schwartz Athletic Center with two courts of action featuring matches Friday, March 1 at 4, 6, and 8 p.m. and continuing Saturday, March 2 with two courts of matches at noon, 2, and 4 p.m.

#1 Springfield 3, Wells 2

Springfield pulled out a narrow five-set victory with set scores of 25-19, 25-21, 23-25, 21-25, 15-13. Four of the five sets were decided by four points or fewer. Wells took the third and fourth sets.

Wells forced a fifth set by pulling out the fourth with four of the last five points on kills from Joe Zimmerman and Caden O'Loughlin and two blocks. The first was from O'Loughlin and Justin Williams and the second was from Josh Undari.

The decisive fifth set was tied 12-12 before Springfield won three of the final four points.

Wells hit .262 in the match and Josh Undari had 50 assists on 54 Wells kills. Caden O'Loughlin had 24 kills and hit .315 in the match. Robert Patzer served four aces. O'Loughlin had 11 digs and Patzer had 10. Undari had two solo blocks and one block assist. Justin Williams had one solo block and two block assists. Patzer had 10 kills and Williams had eight kills.

Wells 3, Rivier 2

Wells took the opening two sets and clinched victory in five sets. Set scores were 25-22, 25-19, 18-25, 23-25, 15-13. It was the second win of the year for Wells over Rivier.

The Express came out firing with a .414 hitting percentage in the opening set and a .571 percentage in the second set. Over the opening two sets Wells had 27 kills with three errors in 50 swings. Rivier battled back to force a fifth set.

In the decisive set, Wells jumped out to an 8-5 lead. Rivier came back to tie it 11-11, but Wells won three in a row a kill from Robert Patzer, a block from Ryan Turner and Justin Williams, and a kill from Turner. After two Rivier points, they had a service error on match point and Wells won it.

Wells hit .275 in the match. O'Loughlin had 19 kills and Patzer had 12. Undari had 28 assists. Patzer had 12 digs, O'Loughlin had 10, and Turner dug out 11. Turner and Cooper Colesante each had one solo block and two block assists.