Oct. 1, 2004
Box Score
EASTON, Pa. (www.lafayette.edu) - If the Lafayette volleyball team isn't on the Patriot League map yet, at least it won't be flying under the radar for the rest of the season. The Leopards held serve at home on Friday night at the Kirby Sports Center, defeating last year's league runner-up, Bucknell, in five games to improve to 9-4 on the season and go to 2-0 in the Patriot League for the first time in school history.
Early in the evening, it looked like it would be a short night for Bucknell (7-6, 1-1 PL), as Lafayette won the first two games, 30-27 and 30-26.
In the opener, Bucknell held a 26-23 lead before sophomore Veronica Canto-Ponce jump-served an ace and won two more points on her serve to knot the score at 26-all. Junior Catherine Herchenroder served out the last four points, closing the game by rifling two aces and gave Lafayette confidence going into game two.
The inside-outside combination of sophomore Shannon Fisher and Canto-Ponce struck in the second game, as each player had five kills to withstand eight kills from Bucknell's Jessica Leahy, and Lafayette pushed its margin to 2-0.
Leahy, who had a match-high 31 kills, carried the Bison to a 30-28 win in the third game as she connected for kills on her last five attacks.
With the score leveled at 26-all in the fourth game, Bucknell quieted the Lafayette faithful with four straight points, and it seemed as though the Bison's experience would make the difference when they went ahead 6-3 in the decisive fifth game.
Then Lafayette made a run of four straight points on Herchenroder's serve to give the Leopards a 7-6 advantage. Bucknell went on a mini-run to go ahead 12-11, before Canto-Ponce stepped up again with three big serves to give Lafayette a pair of match-point opportunities at 14-12.
Sarah Groman and Leahy both put down kills to stifle Lafayette's opportunity, and another point gave Bucknell its only chance to close out the match. Herchenroder responded with one of her four final-game kills to knot the game at 15-all, and then served out the match, which ended on an attack error by Bucknell freshman Jenna Henderson, to give Lafayette its biggest upset in at least a decade.
Lafayette, which remains perfect at home with a 5-0 record, was led by Canto-Ponce's career-high 24 kills to go with 16 from Fisher and a career-high 14 from freshman Michaela Donohue. Olichwier equaled a season-high with 47 assists and is four assists shy of entering the top 10 for a career in Patriot League history.
Donohue had a team-high with 15 digs and was one of four Leopards, joining Herchenroder, Olichwier, and Canto-Ponce, to record four service aces. Lafayette entered the week ranked 13th nationally with 2.47 aces per game.
Bucknell setter Jessica Le registered 43 assists, while libero Carolyn Dougherty had 25 digs and Amanda Grossman made eight blocks.
Lafayette will do it all over again on Saturday, as the Leopards look for a homecoming sweep as Colgate enters the Kirby Sports Center for a 5 p.m. match.
