April 6, 2007

Box Score

The George Mason men's volleyball team hosted Rutgers-Newark on Friday night and the Scarlet Raiders came into the match looking for their first win of the season in Eastern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association action. They left John Linn Memorial Gym still looking for it as the Patriots took a 30-22, 30-24, 30-18 win to improve to 9-8, 5-4 while Rutgers-Newark fell to 2-24, 0-12.

The first two games were tight until the final dozen points while the third game was never in doubt as Kyle Gramit had 14 kills and hit .545, William Price compiled 13 kills while hitting .500, Mark Burik had 10 kills while hitting .643 and Ryan Kwiatkowski had 41 assists and Graham Sheppard had six digs. Colton Naill added five kills on five attacks and Gramit had six digs and four block assists as well. Mason hit .553 as a team while Rutgers-Newark hit just .173. Eric Honsberger led Rutgers-Newark with 15 kills but hit just .286 while Peter Kolinsky had 33 assists.

In the first game, the teams were tied at 18-18 before Kwiatkowski had a kill to put Mason ahead 19-18. Honsberger then had four straight attack errors for the Scarlet Raiders as Mason went up 23-18. Rutgers-Newark wouldn't get closer than four the rest of the game. Mason closed out the game behind a pair of Kyle Swanson kills.

The second game saw the teams tied at 19-19 before Mason slowly pulled away. Naill had a kill and Price had a service ace to build a two-point cushion. Ahead 24-21, Mason pulled away behind Naill's serve as Price had a kill, Peter had an attack error and Naill had a service ace to put the Patriots up 27-21. Mason closed out the game with a Mark Burik kill.

In the final game, the Patriots led from start to finish, building a 15-7 lead and never leading by fewer than seven. Mason hit .700 in the final game with 15 kills and one error on 20 attacks while the Scarlet Raiders were held to a .071 hitting percentage.

The Patriots return to action on Saturday when they host Penn State in the annual Uvaldo Acosta Memorial match, scheduled to begin at 7 p.m. at John Linn Memorial Gym.