The Hofstra University volleyball team lost their fourth straight match, falling to the Binghamton University Bearcats with set scores of 21-25, 25-20, 23-25 and 23-25 in the Pride’s home opener on Wednesday, Sept. 11.
Clara Bal had her fingerprints all over this game, finishing with a team-high of 18 kills, eight digs and eight assists as the junior had little trouble adjusting to her new role as a setter.
“[Bal] loves to be in control, and being a setter is so fun because you’re in control of the court. So, I think, as she learns this a little bit more, she can have a lot of fun with that,” said Hofstra head coach Emily Mansur. “She takes the responsibility as an attacker too because if you’re setting, you know how hard it is to get the set but not get the point. You kind of get a better feeling of both sides that you have to be good at.”
The Pride was playing catch-up for the majority of the first set, struggling to find their rhythm early on. The Pride could not string together solid runs, with only one run of 3-0 or better. With Hofstra on the back foot, the Bearcats took full advantage by finishing the set on a 5-1 run on the back of three kills from Viktoria Dimitrova, as Binghamton struck first.
Hofstra found their groove in the second set, going up 4-2 early, as the Pride looked to finally go on the offensive with Iyana Garvin providing the spark to get the Pride back into the match. The sophomore went without a kill in the first set but recorded four in the second set. With two late kills to help clinch the set, Garvin finished with six kills in the game.
“We need her. The first two matches we won early in the season when we had everybody, our middles’ a big part of the success,” Mansur said. “I think we just need to give our new setters a bit of time to adjust to setting for the middles. That’s why we’re coming up short; a lot of it is those little things we got to fine-tune until we get to the CAA [Coastal Athletic Association] next week.”
In a competitive third set, Binghamton showed its resolve. The Pride carried over the momentum from the previous set, striking first and taking a quick 4-2 lead. Hofstra turned up the energy, going on a 7-0 run in the set to take a 19-12 lead, capped off by Bal’s ninth kill as over 200 Hofstra faithful erupted with cheers.
“It’s huge; we love it,” Mansur said. “We are so thankful that people come; they watch, they enjoy, and we’re going to feel this because we’re going to start doing better and people are going to want to come see us, but we’re very thankful for the people here.”
The Bearcats scratched and clawed their way back going on a 13-4 run to steal the set and put Hofstra on the brink of defeat.
The Pride had no answer for Binghamton’s Ilieva Tsvetelina who recorded a game-high 20 kills, four of them coming late in the set, stunning the Pride while silencing the rowdy crowd.
“I think we’ve seen it a couple times this year, we cannot have a mental break. We’re still giving ourselves a chance to get a mental break in the game and then another team turns it on and it’s hard once you feel the momentum going,” Mansur said. “We just got to really find a way to stay engaged for those 25 points and not stop at 20.”
Deflated, the Pride quickly fell behind 14-8 in the fourth set, but it was Bal who, once again, rallied the team, putting together a stretch with four kills and a service ace to make it a one-point game. Despite eight kills from Bal in the fourth set alone, the Pride fell short yet again, as the Bearcats held on long enough to clinch the victory.
“We all have to step up a little bit more. We, as coaches, got to find one or two more points. The players on the court who are experienced, and the starters have to find one more point and that changes the match,” Mansur said. “Because we are missing a couple of players, we all just have to elevate ourselves a little bit better to make up for that.”
Binghamton, now the winners of four straight games, improved to 5-3 this season. They traveled to Piscataway, New Jersey for the Rutgers Invitational with their opening match against Rutgers University on Thursday, Sept. 12.
With the start of conference play just a week away, Hofstra fell to 2-4 on the season with the loss. Their next match was on Friday, Sept. 13, at 6 p.m. They took on the United States Military Academy at West Point in the opening match of the 2024 Black Knights Invitational.
Photos courtesy of Amelia Bashy
