St. John’s Sweeps Dog Pound Challenge

Saturday, September 15

Storrs, Conn. (Gampel Pavilion)

1:00 PM

St. John's University

11-4

UConn

8-5

St. John's

UConn

9/15/2018 4:38:00 PM | Women's Volleyball

Box Score

Alexakou named Tournament MVP in last match before BIG EAST play.

By: STORRS, Conn.

Box Score

The Red Storm volleyball team ended its nonconference slate with a win over UConn in three sets to give the Johnnies their third tournament title of 2018.

St. John's began the Dog Pound Challenge at UConn on Friday with wins over Rutgers and Holy Cross before setting up a match that served as the deciding contest as the Huskies (8-5) also won their first two matches of the event.

"It was a consummate team effort from start to finish on the road against former BIG EAST rival UConn," Head Coach Joanne Persico said. "We've had a successful, competitve nonconference schedule that will prepare us for the intense play in the BIG EAST Conference."

The Red Storm sits at 11-4 on the season and won the Jack Kaiser Classic and the Cornell Invitational to join this tournament title. This marks the highest win total in the nonconference portion of the season since 2014 when the Johnnies also won 11 outside of the BIG EAST. That team went on to finish 19-14 overall.

Efrosini Alexakou led the team with eight kills against the Huskies and was named Tournament MVP after leading the Johnnies with 37 kills over the weekend. Joining her on the All-Tournament Team was fellow freshman Rachele Rastelli who tied for second on the team with 29 kills and added 11 blocks in Connecticut. Amanda Sanabia earned All-Tournament honors after leading the team in digs with 47 in the three matches. The junior is the conference leader in digs per set (4.94) and was named to the BIG EAST Honor Roll last week.

St. John's hit .310 as a team in the match against UConn and committed only nine attack errors in the three sets compared to 23 for the Huskies. The Johnnies also recorded seven blocks as a team and were blocked only once in the contest.

Four of those blocks came in the first set and Rastelli and Ariadni Kathariou each had three individually in a frame that saw St. John's come out on top 25-18. Erica Di Maulo led the Red Storm with eight assists in the set. The junior ended the match with 31, which led either team.

Alexakou had four kills in the second set that St. John's won 25-19. Rastelli and Nia Diaz added three in frame two. Diaz entered the event with the second-highest hitting percentage in the BIG EAST (.368) and hit a .750 clip in the set and .500 in the match.

The Red Storm took the match in the third set 25-16 with St. John's spreading the ball around offensively as seven different Johnnies posted at least one kill in the frame. Sanabia had seven digs in the final set and ended the match with 15.

St. John's will now look toward the BIG EAST and begin the conference season on the road against Georgetown on Wednesday at 7 p.m.