Box Score NEW LONDON, Conn. – The Bears earned their first New England Women's and Men's Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) win of the season topping Emerson 3-2 Saturday afternoon on the Coast Guard Academy campus.
With the win, Coast Guard improves to 7-3 overall and 1-1 in conference play while the Lions drop to 4-5 on the season and 0-2 in the NEWMAC.
Freshman Bridget Boyle led the way with a team high 16 kills and 12 digs while sophomore Alexi Deane had 12 kills for the Bears. Sophomore Angelou Dunton had 10 kills and 17 digs. Sophomore Makenna Martin had a team high 27 assists and senior Michelle McGill finished with 15 digs.
Freshman Grace Tepper had a match high 17 kills for Emerson and sophomore Kayleen Bertrand had 11 kills and 16 digs. Junior Fara Cohen had 16 digs while junior Moira Brennan had a match high 31 assists and 13 digs.
Emerson came out strong in the first set as they scored the first five points with kills from Brennan and Alexander.
The Bears closed within three at 10-7 on a kill by Dunton from freshman Veronica Hine.
That is as close as Coast Guard would get in the opening set as Emerson pushed their lead all the way to 11 on their way to a 25-18 opening set win.
The Lions took the first three points of the second set for the early 3-0 lead before the Bears came back and tied it on kills from Dunton, Deane and Boyle.
Coast Guard was then able to force Emerson timeout as they took their biggest lead of the set at 20-15.
After the timeout, the Lions rattled off three straight points on kills from Tepper and Bertrand making the score 20-18.
Emerson got within one then at 22-21 before the Bears finished off the second set with the final three points for a 25-21 win and tied the score at one.
Coast Guard then opened-up a tight third set scoring five straight points midway through taking a one point advantage and pushing it to six. Senior Madison Scott had one kill over this stretch.
The Lions got no closer than three the rest of the way as the Bears took a 25-19 win in the third set for a 2-1 advantage.
Emerson was able to climb out of a four-point hole in the fourth set coming back from a 20-16 deficit to score nine of the final ten points of the set for the 25-21 win.
In the fifth and final set Coast Guard hit .583 and dominated from the get go, jumping out to a 9-3 lead highlighted by five straight points over that stretch. Boyle then shut the door on the match with a kill from Martin giving the Bears the set 15-7 and the match 3-2.
The Bears are back in action on Tuesday, September 19th when they travel to South Hadley, Massachusetts to take on the Mount Holyoke Lyons in their third NEWMAC game of the season. Opening serve is 7:00.
