Box Score The men's volleyball squad dropped a 3-0 (12-25, 18-25, 15-25) decision against Lasell in a Great Northeast Athletic Conference contest on the road on Saturday afternoon.
Junior Ryan Kennedy (West Barnstable, Mass.) paced Johnson & Wales with five kills and two blocks while senior setter J.J. Bessette (Coventry, R.I.) notched 17 set assists and a team-high seven digs in the loss for the Wildcats.
Jeffrey Vautrin led the way for Lasell, recording a game-high 10 kills with five digs and two blocks while Dan Raffol narrowly missed a double-double with nine kills and nine digs in the win. Andrew Glenn had 33 set assists for the Lasers.
In the first set, Lasell scored 10 of the first 14 points for the 10-4 lead. The host Lasers took their first double digit lead as the capitalized on a JWU hitting error for the 20-10 lead. After a timeout by the Wildcats, JWU senior Don Dias (Scituate, R.I.) netted a point for the visitors, however, this is as close as they would get before Lasell closed out the game 25-12.
The hosts controlled the second set as well, jumping to an early 10-3 lead. Junior Kyle Eva (Charlestown, R.I.) and senior Chris Espinola (Derry, N.H.) teamed up for the Wildcats to chip away at the score with the help of a few errors from Lasell. Bessette put a point on the board for the Wildcats to cut the lead to 23-17. That would be as close as the Wildcats would get, however as Lasell held on for the 25-18 win.
The two teams traded leads early in the third set, but Lasell pulled away in the middle of the set before taking the 25-15 victory to secure the 3-0 win.
With the loss Johnson & Wales drops to 12-3 on the year and 2-1 in the GNAC while Lasell improves to 11-3 overall and 3-1 in league play. The Wildcats will return to action on Monday, February 23rd when they host Wentworth in a GNAC contest starting at 7:00 p.m.
