J&W box Hunter box MIT box The Sages box
BEVERLY, MA – The Hilbert College men’s volleyball team traveled to Endicott College to participate in their fourteen-team competitive tournament March 24 and 25. Hilbert faced four teams, all with winning records, and returned to Hamburg suffering four straight losses. Adam Weaver led the Hawks with 56 kills, Stephen Phillips earned 104 set-assists, and Ryan Ratajczak collected 43 digs. For his efforts, Weaver garnered a position on the All-Tournament team.
The Hawks opened the tournament with a three-set loss to Johnson & Wales (12-9). Phillips set for 25 of the Hawks 26 assists with distribution to Weaver (12 kills/.500), Fred Sickau (8 kills/.200) and Scott Ross (5 kills). In the 25-19, 25-18, 25-16 sets, Ratajczak got to 14 digs with Adam Clabo lifting 7 digs for the Hawks. Hilbert finished the match hitting in the positive (.256) and earned 4 team blocks.
Later that night, the Hawks faced Hunter College (18-7) the #2 ranked team in Division III. After dropping the first two sets (25-15 and 25-12), Hilbert gained some composure and took Hunter to a 25-22 set/match score. The Hawks again finished hitting in the positive (.167) with Weaver (7/2/25), Ross (6/2/14), Sickau (5/3/16) and Anthony Blasz (4/2/14) seeing most of Phillips 24 assists. With only 18 Hilbert digs, Hunter must have earned most of their points on kills; Hunter’s team statistics were not available at the time of this recap.
On day two, Hilbert took MIT (21-7) to a three-set match (25-17, 25-19, 25-17) March 25. Weaver earned double-figures hitting with 10 kills, and Sickau led the Hawks with 7 digs. In the last game of the tournament, Hilbert played The Sages to a four-set match. After winning the first set (25-20), Hilbert dropped the next three (25-19, 25-11, 25-23) to end their competition in MA. Phillips earned 39 sets with Weaver 27 kills to his career total. Sickau hit for 10 kills and four assisted blocks. Ratajczak kept play alive with 17 digs and ended play with two service aces for Hilbert.
Hilbert (6-20) closes out their season March 31 when they travel to North Buffalo to participate in the Allegheny Mountain Collegiate Conference’s (AMCC) four-team play-offs. Medaille sits as the number one seeded team who hosts the semi-final and final games. Hilbert will face Medaille (11 am), and D’Youville (#2) squares off against Penn State Behrend (#3) at 1 pm. The final match is scheduled for 5pm.
The United Volleyball Conference league play-offs are set for April 14 and 15th with winner of the UVC to earn an automatic bid to the inaugural men’s Division III NCAA championship tournament which begins the weekend of April 21.