By Marco Meglio – STAFF WRITER The Hofstra women’s volleyball team improved to 5-4 on the season after a 3-0 win over Stony Brook University last Tuesday.
“I thought we worked very well on specific things that we have been talking about since last week,” said head coach Emily Mansur. “Our blocking improved a little bit which is an important thing for us to be successful.”
The Pride took the match in sweeping fashion, winning the first set 27-25, the second set 25-18, and the third set 25-20.
“I thought the team stay focused, we kept the lead [but] we gave some runs that we shouldn’t [have] but we kept the lead…especially coming from our 0-3 weekend,” added Mansur.
Hofstra was efficient in their attempts, as they maintained a solid .346 kill percentage compared to Stony Brook’s .218. This made it seemed like Stony Brook had no chance at times, as they barely had any chances in all three sets.
Hofstra out-killed the Seawolves 48-40 and led in other categories such as blocks (10-3), assists (46-39), aces (5-3) and points (63-46).
Veronika Kostova stepped up and recorded 13 kills on the night. She’s taking the offensive leadership role with Kelsie Wills now graduated. Kostova is the next-best returning member of the 2014 team left on offense after she compiled 273 kills last year.
The junior tandem of Kostova and Sophia Black has taken larger responsibilities for the Pride in 2015. After coming off a championship year, they are the cornerstone pieces for this team now.
Black is now the second-best server on the team with 10 service aces after the match. She recorded two aces to help out the Pride in their win over Stony Brook. Kostova is the top offensive weapon for the Pride with 145 kills after the match.
Although (2-6) Stony Brook has been having a subpar season up to that point, Hofstra took confidence in their win and build off of it to break their funk from the three-match losing streak.