MIT Sweeps Men's Volleyball, 3-0

THE BASICS:

- Score: MIT 3, Emmanuel College 0 (25-16, 25-14, 25-15)

- Records: MIT (5-3); Emmanuel College (2-5) 

- Location: Cambridge, Mass. (Rockwell Cage)

- The Lead: The Emmanuel College men's volleyball team dropped a non-conference road match to MIT on Thursday evening by a 3-0 final. The Engineers defeated the Saints by scores of 25-16, 25-14, 25-14.

HOW IT HAPPENED:

- The Engineers jumped out to a 12-4 lead in the opening set and never looked back as MIT took the opening set easily, 25-16. The run to open the match featured two kills from Troy Oliveira (San Diego, Calif.), Nicholas Gustafson (San Diego, Calif.) and Dylan Ryan (Oviedo, Fla.), while Cole Linnus (Wellington, Fla.) chipped in with a kill and an ace of his own. A swing by Gustafson gave MIT its largest lead of the set at ten (19-9) and a kill by Seth Fine (Allentown, Pa.) gave MIT the set, 25-16.

- In the second, MIT battled from an early 3-1 deficit and went ahead 14-7 midway through the stanza as a swing by Oliveira capped off the 13-4 spurt. Ahead by a 22-13 score, two kills by Brett Allen (San Jose, Calif.) and one from Gustafson gave the Engineers the second 25-14.

- The third and final set featured eight ties with the final one coming at 10-10. Up by just two at 15-13, MIT closed the set and the match on a 10-1 run to win the stanza 25-14 and the match 3-0. The match-ending run featured a trio of aces by Linnus as well as a pair of kills from Bradley Albright (Burnt Hills, N.Y.).

INSIDE THE NUMBERS: 

- Oliveira (.214), Gustafson (.636), Allen (.188) and Ryan (.286) all registered seven kills for the Engineers, while Linnus hit .556 with six kills and five aces. Fine dished out a match-high 21 assists, while Michael Kulinski (New Lenox, Ill.) added 15 helpers of his own.

- EC senior Justyn Schueler (Trumbull, Conn.) collected a team-high eight kills while senior setter Seamus McDonagh (Long Beach, N.Y.) dished out 12 assists while collecting six digs.

- On the defensive side of the ball, MIT's Thomas Nelson (San Ramon, Calif.) notched a match-high eight digs, while Oliveira posted a solo block and Ryan added a trio of block assists.

- MIT led statistically in kills (40-18), hitting percentage (.304- -.014), assists (39-14), aces (6-0), digs (29-21) and blocks (1-0).

UP NEXT:

- Emmaunel returns to action on Saturday, Ferbuary 8 for a single match against Dean College at 11:00 AM.
- MIT will host a tri-match in DuPont Gymnasium on Saturday, February 8 beginning at 12:00 pm. The Engineers will play Elms in the first match and Illinois Tech at 5:00 pm. Elms and Illinois Tech will play each other in the middle match at 2:30 pm.