On the last home game of the season for the Hofstra volleyball team, seniors Hannah Klemm, Semen Sen, Sophia Black and Veronika Kostova capped off a tremendous regular season, winning their 13th straight match at the Physical Education Building, beating the College of Charleston for their 19th win of 2016.
The win not only capped off the first undefeated home season since 2004 for the Pride – in which they also went 12-0 – but also pushed them into a half-game behind Northeastern (20-7) for the top seed in the CAA.
Hofstra had three players finish the match with double-digit kills, one being Nanishka Perez and head coach Emily Mansur could not be more impressed by her.
“It was great to see her play so well,” Mansur said. “She came up for this match and played a really great game … It was definitely a very positive thing to see since she struggled her last match. Paola (Figueroa) also stepped up in a similar way. She had a good game a few games ago, struggled in the past one, but told me that she was ready to go today.”
Figueroa tacked on eight kills, contributing to the Hofstra grand total of 57 by the end of the match. The other two players who added on 11 kills each were sophomore Michela Rucli and freshman Laura Masciullo. For Masciullo, her freshman campaign is nothing short of remarkable, leading the team with an outstanding 345 kills this year, which is good for third in the conference.
Klemm has also made her conference presence even more known this year, as she is fifth in the CAA in assists on the season with just three games remaining before tournament time. Additionally, in all six major statistics that are kept track of (kills, assists, service aces, digs, blocks and hitting percentage) Hofstra has a total of six players featured nine times in all categories combined.
Hofstra finished the match hitting nearly .300, as they hit over that threshold in the second and fourth sets. The set scores were 24-26, 25-19, 25-18 and 25-20. Hofstra held Charleston to a .188 attack percentage in the third set and even improved in the fourth set as the Cougars were only able to put together a .122 hitting percentage as they would go on to earn the win. Hofstra wraps up the season with away games at Towson, Elon and Delaware.
