BEVERLY, Mass. – Despite taking a 2-1 match lead, the Southern Vermont College men's volleyball team's season came to an end Friday evening as the third-seeded Mountaineers lost 3-2 to No. 2 Daniel Webster College in the New England Collegiate Conference (NECC) semifinal round at Endicott College's MacDonald Gymnasium.
The Eagles improve to 13-13 on the season while SVC finishes the year 13-13.
DWC took the first set 25-21 before Southern Vt. won the next two by margins of 25-16 ad 25-22. The Eagles sent the contest to the deciding fifth game with a 25-21 fourth-set victory and then clinched a berth in the championship with a 15-12 winning tally in the final frame.
Mountaineer senior Anthony Barahona (Eagle Rock, Calif.) was named to the All-Tournament Team, posting a match-best 25 kills to go with 10 digs, three service aces, two solo blocks and three block assists. Junior Keven Walley (Pico Rivera, Calif.) followed with 14 kills and five digs, and junior Scott Fitzgerald (Fort Edward, N.Y.) just missed the double-double with 11 kills and nine digs.
Senior setter Anthony Ayala (Pico Rivera, Calif.) assisted on 50 of the 52 SVC kills while junior libero Florentino Escovedo (Fresno, Calif.) registered 19 digs, tying the match-high.
The Eagles were carried offensively by senior outside Joe Walz (East Longmeadow, Mass.) and junior middle Joel Hendrix (Kane'ohe, Hawaii) who combined for 43 kills and a .370 hitting percentage while sophomore setter Ariel Frias (Lawrence, Mass.) dished out 55 assists with 12 digs. Defensively, sophomore Ryan Howdeshell (Fairbanks, Alaska) matched Esvodedo's match-high 19 digs.
With the match tied 2-2 heading into the fifth, Southern Vt. jumped out to a 3-1 advantage after a kill by Fitzgerald. Daniel Webster battled back to tie the match 4-4 as Walz powered two kills.
The Mountaineers rattled off four straight points in the fifth, taking advantage of their opponent's miscues to own an 8-4 advantage as the two teams switched sides. Daniel Webster fired right back with four straight points of their own to knot the score at 8-8 as Hendrix got the rally going with a kill.
The two teams went back-and-forth and, with the score at 11-10 SVC, Walz dominated the home stretch for Daniel Webster by recording kills on four of the next five points to give the Eagles a 14-12 lead. DWC sophomore middle Jose Vargas (Lawrence, Mass.), who had 13 kills in the match, delivered the final point for Daniel Webster with a kill to end the fifth set 15-12.
The two senior members of the Mountaineers finished their careers at the top of school record lists. Barahona tallied 1,080 kills in his tenure at SVC, 459 more than the second player in the category. Barahona is now also first all-time in career service aces with 89 while Ayala finished second with 47. Barahona also put himself at second in all-time blocks (180) and digs (668). Ayala topped the career assists list with 1,831, 432 more than any other player in program history.
Barahona now owns the four best years in terms of most kills, besting his previous three season totals with 289 in 2014. Ayala also beat out the previous record of most assists in a season, recording 928 this year to blow away the previous record of 819. Fitzgerald now owns the record for most service aces in a season with 39, topping the previous record of 30, and Escovedo now ranks second for the most digs in one year with a tallied 294 in 2014.
Daniel Webster will now face Endicott in the championship round Saturday at 4 p.m. The top-seeded Gulls blanked No. 4 Regis College 3-0 earlier Friday afternoon.