NIAGARA UNIVERSITY, N.Y. – Fairfield University Volleyball traveled to Western New York on Friday morning with a pair of fellow MAAC unbeatens on the slate. The Stags boarded the bus back to campus of Sunday afternoon as the last squad standing with a perfect conference tally, sweeping Niagara on Sunday afternoon to complete a 2-0 weekend.
Winner of five straight matches and eight of nine, the Stags are now 9-6 overall and 4-0 in the MAAC. The Purple Eagles drop to 6-7 on the season and 3-1 in league play.
Coupled with Saturday's 3-0 win at Canisius, Fairfield completes the MAAC's arduous "Buffalo trip" with a pair of wins for the first time since 2017. The Stags also posted 3-0 victories on both ends of the swing for the first time since 2006.
"Overall, this was a very solid team weekend," said Head Coach
Todd Kress. "I thought we got better as the weekend went on, and we played arguably two of our best sets of the season today against Niagara."
Manuela Nicolini starred on both ends of the net this afternoon, guiding the Stags to a .340 hitting percentage via 37 assists. She also dumped over two kills of her own and landed a pair of service aces. Definitely, Nicolini racked up a match-best six blocks and recorded seven digs.
Nicolini's primary target on the outside was
KJ Johnson, who led all players with 16 digs at a .483 clip. Johnson competed a double-double with a team-high 10 digs. The MAAC leader in kills is now averaging 4.67 kills per set swinging at a .317 percentage.
In the middle,
Ella Gardiner had a career-high eight kills hitting .429 and
Emily Schillinger chipped in five kills.
Laura Seeger and
Luci Albertson rounded out the attack with seven and four kills, respectively.
Schillinger matched Nicolini's six blocks to guide Fairfield's 11-block effort overall. Gardiner got a piece of three rejections with Johnson and Seeger each playing a role in one send-back. In the back row,
Morgan Doll returned to the lineup and notched eight digs along with a service ace, and
Julia Kallen registered seven digs. In total, the Fairfield defensive performance limited Niagara to a .104 hitting percentage.
"Manuela did a great job of distributing the ball, making us much more balanced offensively today. Emily and Ella did well in the middle both in transition and closing blocks to contain Niagara's offense. And KJ had another breakout performance hitting over .400 on the outside," Kress noted. "We'll take Monday and Tuesday off to regroup physically from the trip, then get back at it in the practice gym on Wednesday"
This weekend started a span in which Fairfield will play five of six league matches away from campus. Up next is the lone home contest during that stretch as in-state MAAC foe Quinnipiac comes to the RecPlex on Saturday, Oct. 2 at 1 p.m.
Fans who plan to attend Saturday's match are reminded that masks are required for all – regardless of vaccination status -- in all indoor facilities on campus.
