Tigermedia - CUNY Athletic Conference: Women's Community College Volleyball Finals: Queensborough vs. BMCC (2016)
CUNY Athletic Conference: Women's Community College Volleyball Finals: Queensborough vs. BMCC (2016)
Date: October 24th, 2016
Duration:
1h:35m:55s
Game summary provided by CUNY Athletics:
http://www.cunyathletics.com/news/2016/10/25/CCWVB_1025161347.aspx
Championship Game: #1 Queensborough vs. #2 BMCC
The Queensborough Tigers advanced to the CUNYAC finals against the BMCC Panthers looking for their 5th CUNYAC title since 2010. The Tigers were looking to cap off an impressive year after going undefeated this in CUNYAC play with a perfect 8-0 record this season. Queensborough would claim this year’s championship after defeating BMCC in three straight sets to make it a back to back title winning campaign for the Tigers.
“We had such a great year, but that could’ve all been erased in one day,” said QCC head coach Jason Demas.
The first set began with Queensborough taking the first point after a Panthers defensive lapse. The Tigers road to back to championships would not be an easy one as the first set would be hotly contested early on. Queensborough’s offensive onslaught would keep rolling from last game however, as the Tigers jumped out to an early 8-2 lead behind kills from Carmen Clavijo. The Tigers would build upon this lead until it was 13-5 and BMCC would take a time out. After the Panthers would rally to get within 4 points after an ace by Damali Prince, the score stood at 15-11 in favor of QCC. After several Queensborough errors and some timely defense, the Panthers of BMCC tied the first set at 18. Their bench erupted the moment the Tigers hit the ball out of bounds.After some more great defense by BMCC they took a 22-20 lead and tensions were high with every strike of the ball. QCC would then rebound to tie it at 22 after a brilliant kill by Joelle Desrosiers. And additional BMCC attacking error then gave the Tigers a late 23-22 lead. After a long volley, BMCC would gain the point to tie it at 23. QCC came right back and score the next point to have a 24-23 lead. The Tigers would take the first set after a kill by Zuri Williams.
“That was the best I’ve seen them play the entire season, I think we were a little relaxed and we needed a little motivation and that woke us up,” said Coach Demas. The first set was exactly the wake up call that the Tigers were looking for.
The second set would begin where the first one left off, BMCC would jump out to an early lead, albeit a slim 6-5 one. The Tigers would rally to take a 10-8 lead following some mishaps for BMCC. They would seize this momentum to then go up 15-10 behind some more offensive attack by Williams. The Tigers would continue to play great team volleyball to increase their lead to 18-11. QCC’s Carmen Clavijo would get a kill for the Tigers that would keep them up 19-15. Following yet another BMCC attacking error, the Tigers lead would grow to 23-16 and the Panthers would be forced to take a time out. Returning from the timeout, Queensborough would increase their lead to 24-16 and a BMCC returning error would give the Tigers a win in set number two.
The third set would begin with the Tigers striking first after scoring eight unanswered points to open things up. BMCC would then take a time out to gather themselves. The Tigers would allow a point out of the break but continue to improve their lead to 12-1. Queensborough would continue the attack to move their lead up to 20-3. Following an attacking error by the Tigers, the score would move to 24-7 in favor of QCC. The winning point was then scored after a service error by BMCC and the QCC Tigers would claim the 2016 CUNYAC CC Women’s Volleyball title for the second year in a row. QCC’s Zuri Williams would walk away with the Tournament’s MVP award after recording 20 total kills throughout, the most of any player on the court.
When asked what it takes to make a good volleyball player, Williams had this to say, “it takes a lot of practice, staying dedicated to the sport and a lot of focus in everything that you do."