Box | Updated stats
ROCHESTER, NY – Seniors Zachary Gillard and Ethan Ross had nine kills each and fellow senior Tyler Farnung added 23 assists and two aces to lead the Nazareth College men's volleyball team to a 3-0 victory over Sage Friday night in a United Volleyball Conference match in Kidera Gymnasium.
Nazareth (10-9 overall, 2-4 UVC) won by set scores of 25-10, 25-17 and 25-16. Sage falls to 6-12 overall and 1-6 in UVC play. Both teams will play matches Saturday at Nazareth as the Golden Flyers host Vassar and Sage takes on Medaille at 11 a.m. Vassar plays Mount St. Joseph at 1:30 and Nazareth finishes the day against Mount St. Joseph with a 4 p.m. match.
Friday's match was senior night as the three Nazareth seniors were honored prior to the start of the match.
The Golden Flyers had great starts to each of the first two sets and jumped out to 4-0 leads in each. Nazareth led 21-8 in the opener before four of the last six points after a Gator timeout to take the first set.
After the quick start to the second set, the teams traded points for most of the rest of the set as Nazareth led 18-13 late in the set. The Golden Flyers then ran off six of the next seven points and cruised to the victory.
The third set had a closer start as the teams traded points and the score was tied at 11-11 midway through the set. After a service error by Sage, freshman Jordan Hildreth converted a pair of kills and Nazareth used three Sage errors to take a 17-11 lead.
After the Gators scored their 12th point, Hildreth added another kill followed by a kill for junior Sean Dillon as Nazareth pulled ahead 19-12.
Sage answered with a pair of points and trailed by five at 19-14 before Gillard and Ross recorded consecutive kills. Ross added another kill to give the Golden Flyers a 22-15 edge and Farnung scored with his second ace of the night followed by another Gillard kill for the 24-15 lead.
A service error sealed the win for Nazareth.
Ross finished with nine kills on 10 swings (.900 pct) and Hildreth had 12 kills, two errors and 17 attacks for a .588 percentage. Freshman
Jason Proud led Nazareth with eight digs and junior
Luis Vazquez added seven digs.