ERIE, Pa. – The Medaille women's volleyball team won their first-ever Allegheny Mountain Collegiate Conference (AMCC) Championship with a 3-1 win over Penn State Behrend in the title match on Sunday afternoon.
The Mavericks (16-12), who entered the tournament with their only conference loss to the Lions (19-9), went down a set to start (25-19) but never backed down to win the next there 25-18, 25-10 and 25-21 for the league crown.
Medaille relied on heavy hitter Meghan Fahy with 25 kills, 17 digs and four blocks. Talford Simmone was the one dishing the ball to Fahy, registering a match-best 46 assists. The Mavericks had three players with 23 digs, including libero Mario Antsupova.
Chelsea Magnusen (Plum, PA/Plum) led Behrend with 27 assists and 13 digs, while Mary Sperry (Atlantic, PA/Conneaut Lake) recorded a match-high 27 digs. Alyssa Pears (Meadville, PA/Meadville) tallied a team-best nine kills.
The Lions took advantage of the 12 attack errors by Medaille in the first set to take a 1-0 lead in the match. Fahy had six errors alone at the net, while Pears had four of her nine kills in the opening set. With a five-point edge at 22-17, Pears knocked in two kills and the Mavericks had two attack errors for the final points to give Behrend the 25-19 win.
Medaille evened the match with a 25-18 set-two victory. The Mavericks never trailed and held a seven-point lead all the way until the end. The momentum from the second set carried over to the third. Fahy paced Medaille with seven kills on 12 attacks with one error. The Mavericks posted seven straight kills, including four from Fahy to pull away 25-10.
The fourth set was much like the first. Neither team led by more than two points until the final four points. With Medaille holding a 21-20 lead, Robyn Stanley and Fahy nailed back-to-back kills and after a service error Fahy made her 25th kill the sweetest for a 25-21 win for the AMCC title.
Behrend will await a bid to the ECAC Tournament, announced on Monday.
