Volleyball Season Slips Away in NESCAC Play

Author: Dan Russell

The Middlebury College women's volleyball team saw their season come to a disappointing end this past weekend at the NESCAC tournament held at Williamstown, Mass. The Panthers, seeded seventh, faced Bates College in the first round. Although the Panthers fought valiantly against the Bobcats (26-9, 9-1 in NESCAC), and kept the matches close, they were never able to mount any real kind of offensive as they lost in three straight matches (23-30, 26-30, and 21-30).

Despite the heartbreaking loss, the Panthers have much to look forward to in the upcoming season. While departing seniors Danielle Boniello and Luz Brito will be greatly missed, their core group of players will remain the same. The team, which was often marred by inconsistency and struggled to find its identity this year, should emerge as a confident, poised, multifaceted squad and as one of the better teams in the NESCAC.

The defense, an area in which the Panthers often struggled this year, should be greatly improved and should allow Middlebury to take advantage of its powerful offense. Due to their youth and to several injuries the Panthers suffered this year, many players were thrust into new roles to which they were unaccustomed. As players have had time to grow comfortable with their new roles, the Panthers should benefit greatly from the experience as they now have a more versatile squad in which many of the pieces are interchangeable.

A team which had only two seniors this year will now be composed of seven upperclassmen (three seniors, four juniors) as well as three first-years who, having had time to observe from the sidelines, should be ready to step in and make a significant contribution. On offense the team will be anchored by captain Katy Hicks '05, who was a dominant force on offense this year, as well as the versatile Sydney Hartsock '05. Defensive stalwart Jamie Wong '06 will be returning to power the defense along with Laurie Wollin '05 and phenomenal freshman Lacee Patterson '06.5 should be even better next year. And even though the team struggled somewhat this year, they still managed five conference victories and finished the season a respectable 12-13.

"We had a great season. Although there was kind of an adjustment period at the start because of all the new players, I feel like we were able to make some of the necessary adjustments and learn to really work with each other," said the departing Boniello. "I feel like our defense was an area we really needed to improve upon, but that we really picked it up the second half of the season. I think we should have a really great team next year"