Red Storm Downs DePaul in Five Sets

Saturday, October 13

Queens, N.Y. (Carnesecca Arena)

5:00 PM

St. John's University

16-7 (5-3BE)

DePaul

5-15 (3-6BE)

DPU

St. John's

10/13/2018 8:07:00 PM | Women's Volleyball

Box Score

St. John’s takes final three sets in five-set thriller

By: Eric Robinson

Box Score

The St. John's volleyball team won in five sets over DePaul at Carnesecca Arena on Saturday after dropping the first two sets.

This marked the 10th time this season the Red Storm has played a five-set match, tying a program record set back in 2004. The Johnnies are 6-4 this season in matches that have gone the full five sets.

Erica Di Maulo finished the match with 60 assists and in the process passed Deniz Mutlugil for fourth in program history in career assists. The setter now has 3,326 assists in her career and sits behind Wioleta Leszczynska for third in the history of St. John's volleyball. Leszczynska finished her career at St. John's in 2008 with 4,374 assists.

Amanda Sanabia also rose the career leaderboard finishing with 20 digs. The junior has led the team in digs in every match this season and passed Robyn Kurasaki for seventh on the career digs list. The junior now has 1,159 career digs, 139 behind Gabriela Petkova in sixth.

Offensively Efrosini Alexakou led the Johnnies and set a career high with 23 kills on the match. She also recorded her eighth double-double of the season with 11 digs on the night as well. Kayley Wood finished behind her with 19 kills, one shy of tying her career high in the category.

Service errors killed the Johnnies in the first set, and despite a .293 hitting percentage, DePaul took the first set 26-24. The Blue Demons hit .433 in the frame, finishing the opener without an error. Alexakou finished set one with six kills for the Red Storm with Rachele Rastelli behind her with four.

St. John's had a set point, but three straight points by DePaul gave the Blue Demons the 1-0 set lead going into the second. The Johnnies fell 25-21 in that second set despite four kills from Wood. The Red Storm would tie the match at 20-20 before DePaul would take five of the next six points to put them one set away from taking the match.

The Red Storm took a very competitive third set 29-27 behind seven kills from Alexakou. The freshman hit .353 in the frame and Di Maulo put up 16 assists for the Johnnies.

DePaul had St. John's down 24-22 before three-straight points put the Red Storm up 25-24. It got to 27-27 before a kill by Wood and an attack error by DePaul cut the lead to 2-1.

The Johnnies carried that momentum into set four with a 25-16 win to push it to a fifth set. Wood posted six kills in the frame and as a team St. John's hit .333. The Red Storm went on a 7-2 run up 7-5 and did not look back until Hanna Wagner put home the set-winning kill. Wagner finished the match with six kills on eight attempts, hitting .625 on the match. The junior also added four blocks for St. John's.

The Red Storm took the match in the fifth frame behind a .409 hitting percentage and zero attack errors in the frame. Alexakou had four kills in the set and after falling behind 3-0, the Johnnies finished the match on a 15-6 run to improve to 5-3 in BIG EAST play.

St. John's will host Marquette to end the first half of conference play on Sunday at 3 p.m.