Amanda Boyer/Photography Editor
The Pirates improved to 13-3 following their 3-2 win over St. John’s on Wednesday.
Undefeated in the conference is all the motivation the team needed as they headed into Wednesday’s meeting with St. John’s University.
It was a slow start for the Pirates as the Red Storm started the first set aggressively with a lead of 7-3 that the Pirates were never able to catch up to as St. John’s won the first set 25-22.
The Pirates started the second set on the attack registering an 11-5 lead. Junior Amanda Hansen registered 10 kills and spoke about the team’s focus.
“The team has really been focusing on working hard at practice because hard work in practice translates over to games and helps us to get big wins that we need for the momentum going into other games.”
That momentum started to really overpower the Red Storm as the Pirates took the second set to tie, 1-1.
The Pirates again came out aggressive as they jumped out to a 7-2 lead in the third set, forcing the Red Storm to call their first time out. It was a team effort to establish a strong defensive front which included Stacey and Shelbey Manthorpe.
Shelbey finished with 45 assists, 12 digs, 8 kills, and seven blocks. Stacey had 18 kills and 11 digs, she commented about the teams focus going forward, ”In order for our team to be successful throughout the Big East season we need to continue to be strong in serve/receive.”
The Manthorpe sisters defensive stance and sophomore Tessa Fournier, who recorded a team high 21 digs allowed for the Pirates to take the lead 2-1 in the sets.
Four lead changes in the fourth set would eventually swing in St. John’s favor as they tied the sets at two apiece.
“We have to keep working on the little things that are still problems and fix them. I’m looking forward to this weekend and getting wins against some huge teams and being able to prove that we are a lot stronger this year,” junior Molly Grammer said.
The final set would prove Seton Hall’s dominance in the game as they never lost a lead to the Red Storm. Redshirt-senior Simona Sekulova logged 14 kills in the match to help the team win the set 15-10 and the match, 3-2. She said, “This is by far the most driven team I have been on throughout my experience at SHU. We have a hard working team.”
The Pirates will travel to Butler on Friday, Oct. 3 in their next match looking to add on to their 7 game win streak.
Rene Pereira can be reached at rene.pereira@student.shu.edu or on twitter @ReneRene24.
