STRONG HITTING LEADS PRIDE TO CONFERENCE WIN

WESTON, Mass. – The Regis College men's volleyball team earned a 3-0 (25-22, 25-16, 25-19) sweep of New England Collegiate Conference foe Elms College in a St. Patrick's Day matchup on Higgins Court. With the victory, the Pride improve to 6-14, 3-4 NECC on the year and with the loss, the Blazers drop to 3-17, 0-7 NECC.

Both teams kept trading points during the first set as Elms built up an early advantage. A Christian Aroyo (Chicopee, Mass.) service ace forced a Pride timeout as the Blazers took a 7-4 lead. The Pride regained composure after the timeout and scored five straight points while Marcus Aguirre (Norwalk, Calif.) was serving.

A Ryan Conte (Oxnard, Calif.) kill that was assisted by Josiah Roque (Oxnard, Calif.) gave the Crimson and Gold their second lead of the contest. However, the Blazers responded by outscoring the Pride 9-5 over the next few serves and regained the lead 16-14. Both teams would knot up the score three more times during the set, but Regis would reach 25 points first and take an early 1-0 advantage.

Senior setter Kevin Welsh (Wilbraham, Mass.) recorded his 2,000 career assist midway through the first set on a kill by Blake Fry (Natick, Mass.).

Set two was all Regis as they opened the set on a 15-5 run; Elms made a late push scoring four straight points and then a kill from Brett Krahl (Santa Clartia, Calif.) ended the run. The Blazers kept matching the Pride's points, but Elms couldn't comeback from Regis's hot start and fell 25-16 in the second set.

During the second set, the Pride hit an impressive.344 led by Marcos Aguirre's six kills and .556 hitting percentage.

The third set was a streaky one as both teams went on separate scoring binges. Elms built up an early 3-2 lead led by Regis errors and a kill from Blake Fry. The Pride would then go on an 8-1 run to take a commanding 10-4 lead in the third set forcing the Blazers to call a timeout.

Elms would respond to Regis's run with one of their own scoring five straight points before an attack error by Qua'Sean Crowe (Stamford, Conn.) ended the Blazer run. The Pride regained momentum after Kerby Billy (Dorchester, Mass.) hit a loose ball into the ground and upped the Pride advantage to 20-11.

Elms responded by scoring five straight points while Kevin Welsh was serving to pull within four points 20-16, but the Pride outscored the Blazers 5-3 over the final serves and took the third set and the match against Elms.

The Pride continued their strong hitting performance by hitting .371 during the third set. Marcos Aguirre contributed on offense with a game-high 13 kills and hit .321 during the match. Ryan Husher (Camarillo, Calif.) added eight kills, five digs and two assists. Joe Hanrahan (Conventry, R.I.) came off the bench and took over the game by dishing out a game-high 29 assists while also adding six digs and two kills.

For the Blazers, Qua'Sean Crowe led the attack with a team-high six kills and also contributed a block. Blake Fry added five kills and made six defensive digs. Kevin Welsh paced the offense by dishing out a team-high 18 assists while also chipping in with six digs and three kills.

The Pride welcome conference foe Newbury at 11:00 a.m. and non-conference rival CCNY 3:00 p.m. to campus for a tri-match on Saturday, March 21st. The Blazers are off until Monday, March 23rd when they host conference rival Lesley at 7:00 p.m.