Women's volleyball competed in the Buffalo Invite tournament this weekend, going 3-0 against DePaul (2-3), Montana (1-4), and Binghamton (3-3) to improve to 6-0 and continue their promising start to their season.
The team hasn’t started a season this hot since 2013 when they started 12-0 and ended the season 18-12.
Thursday, the Bulls faced DePaul, winning 3-0. Freshman outside/right side hitter Manoela Forlin led the team with 11 kills, while fifth year middle Courtney Okwara had 10 and senior right side Emma Gielas had nine. Junior setter Mandy Leigh had 35 assists for the Bulls which provided the spark they needed to control the offense.
The Bulls nearly let the last two sets get away from them which would’ve allowed the match to continue, but they held on to win.
On Friday, UB beat Montana 3-1 after great performances by senior outside hitter Katrin Trebichavska, Forlin and once again Gielas. Trebichavska dominated with 16 kills on 38 attempts, Forlin with 11 kills on 23 attempts, and Gillas had nine kills on 19 attempts. On the defensive side of things, junior libero Maria Futey racked up 17 digs. Leigh tallied 12, and Manoela had 11. The Bulls concluded their invite on Saturday by taking down Binghamton Bearcats by a score of 3-0, defending their home court of Alumni Arena.
The first and third sets were close — both 25-22 — while the second set provided more comfort to the Bulls with a score of 25-19. UB recorded a hitting percentage of .271% with only 15 errors compared to Binghamton’s .195% and 12 errors.
Gielas led the UB offense with 11 kills while putting up two blocks on defense. Gielis is one kill away from 50 on the season, which is second on the team behind outside hitter Trebichavska (66). Leigh commanded the court with 25 assists, four kills, and 11 digs while her sister Abby had nine kills, four blocks, and one ace. Leigh now has 205 assists on the season to lead the team.
The Bulls (6-0) will travel to the Xavier Invitational in Cincinnati, OH for their next matchups against Missouri (5-1), Xavier (3-3) and Bellarmine (2-4). The tournament begins on Sept. 8 at 10 a.m.
Correction: An earlier version of this article state that "junior setter Mandy Leigh had 35 aces." She had 35 assists. We regret this error.
The sports desk can be reached at sports@ubspectrum.com
Michael Scotto is an assistant sports editor for The Spectrum. In his free time he's either playing volleyball or catching up on sports.
Photo: Ryan Hagen | UB Athletics
