St. John’s Defeats Seton Hall in Four Sets

Sunday, September 26

South Orange, N.J. (Walsh Gym)

2 p.m.

St. John's University

10-6,1-1Big East

Seton Hall

8-8,0-2Big East

St. John's (NY)

Seton Hall

9/26/2021 7:06:00 PM | Women's Volleyball

Box Score Box Score (PDF)

Red Storm captures first conference win.

SOUTH ORANGE, N.J. (Sept. 26, 2021) – The St. John's volleyball team defeated Seton Hall in four sets on Sunday afternoon at Walsh Gymnasium to claim its first BIG EAST victory of the season.

The Johnnies took the first two sets, 29-27, and 25-22, respectively, before dropping the third set, 26-24. St. John's rallied to win the fourth set, 28-26.

Klara Mikelova led the Johnnies (10-6, 1-1 BIG EAST), tallying a double-double with 14 kills and 12 digs. Rachele Rastelli, the nation's leader in total points, recorded a second-best 13 kills to go along with a service ace and five blocks.

Two other Johnnies tallied double-digit kills. Eleonora Tosi racked up 12 kills on a .364 hitting percentage to go along with six block assists. Giorgia Walther contributed 10 kills while she and Ariadni Kathariou each chipped in five block assists.

Wiktoria Kowalcyzk posted 31 assists, four block assists, three kills and two service aces while Tiziana Baumrukova, the BIG EAST's leader in total assists, added 19 helpers.

Sheena Yoshioka and Bree Martin each recorded a service ace each while also logging nine and five digs, respectively.

St. John's earned the victory despite being without one of its top talents in BIG EAST Preseason Player of the Year Efrosini Alexakou, who missed the match due to injury.

"I'm super proud of our squad today," said Head Coach Joanne Persico. "They only had 21 hours to regroup, refocus and get re-energized to find a way to win. Beginning the match without one of our top players, the team fought through some adversity to beat a well-organized, physical Seton Hall team that is always so well at home."

Seton Hall (8-8, 0-2 BIG EAST) was up, 5-2, in the first set when St. John's poured in an 8-1 run to take a 10-6 lead. After the Pirates rallied to tie the set at 11, the teams went toe-to-toe until the Johnnies recorded three straight points to take the set, 29-27. Of the last three points, Mikelova was responsible for two.

Down 13-10 in the second set, the Red Storm went off on a 9-2 run to grab a 19-15 advantage. Seton Hall recorded three straight points to pull within one before St. John's responded by grabbing six of the next 10 to win the set, 25-22.

Trailing 19-15 late in the third set, St. John's battled to even the score at 24 before back-to-back kills for the Pirates from Jenna Walsh and Julia Wilkins forced a fourth set.

The final frame saw the Red Storm down 8-3 before Mikelova recorded three kills on an 10-1 spurt to put the Johnnies on top, 13-9. Like the first three sets, all of which were closely contested, the teams again traded blows before Rastelli put down two kills to take the set, 28-26, and the match, 3-1.

St. John's will play its BIG EAST home opener next weekend on Friday against Creighton at 7 p.m.