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ALFRED, NY – The Alfred University women's volleyball team took the No. 1 team in the Empire 8, St. John Fisher College to five sets in a close battle but fell in conference action on Saturday in the Terry S. Galanis Family Arena.
 
The Saxons (6-15, 0-4 Empire 8) won both the first and third sets but were edged in the final two sets. The finished with a set score line of 25-17, 22-25, 25-20, 18-25, 13-15. "I'm proud of the fact that we played the best volleyball I have ever seen since I've been hired here," Head Coach Dakota Pruiss said. "It's just unfortunate that it came with a loss. I think all of our athletes were dedicated to that match and to do it in front of our 1999 team was an honor. We played to honor our program today."
 
Julia Fanning (Wallkill, NY/Wallkill Senior) had another strong outing as she broke her career-high in set assists with 39 in five sets of play. Her previous best was 33 in four sets in a win over Buffalo State in September of this season. She also tacked on a game-high four aces to tie Fisher's Alea Steigerwald. Fanning added one kill and one block assist for 5.5 points on the day and had eight digs.
 
Amber Smith (Penfield, NY/Webster Schroeder) led the game with 18 kills as she recorded another double-double on the weekend, contributing 10 digs as well. She finished with a team-high 18.0 points. Lainey Arneson (Yorktown, VA/Tabb) set her career-high in points and kills with 9.5 and seven on Friday evening at Nazareth and smashed that mark on Saturday against Fisher. She recorded 15.5 points from 11 kills and added a career-high six total blocks with a career-high three solo blocks.
 
Defensively, the Saxons were led by Darian Ortiz (Santa Fe, NM/St. Michael's) with 21 digs and Alex Taylor (Rancho Cucamonga, CA/Los Osos) with 13 digs.
 
In the first set, it was all Saxons to start things off as they built a 6-1 lead with two kills from Smith and one from Sarah Raeman (Canandaigua, NY/Canandaigua) off of Fanning assists and one Fanning ace. A few back-and-forth exchanges later, it was still an Alfred advantage at 10-7 before the hosts went on a 10-3 scoring spree to make it a 20-10 Saxon set. Fisher made things interesting with four, unanswered points in response to the Saxon run but two attack errors and one service error from the Cardinals along with kills from Raeman and Kayle Hatfield (Descanso, CA/Granite Hills), the Saxons got the early, 1-0 lead.
 
In the third set, after a close second, Fisher was the team that got the early advantage on the scoreboard before AU popped up a 7-3 run to tie it at 10. Fisher gave a push to retake the lead, 14-11 but the Saxons refused to give any more ground, catching back up and making it a 17-17 set. Both teams teeter-tottered on the scoreboard until it was, once again, tied with a score of 20-20. Alfred University regained the serve off a kill from Hatfield (Fanning assist) and then behind the serves of Fanning, closed out the set with three of her four aces and a Fisher attack error.
 
In the fifth and deciding set, AU managed to build a 9-6 lead after scoring six, unanswered points. Fisher's offense put scored five points off of kills, one from an ace and then the rest from errors by Alfred to claim the Empire 8 match.
 
The Saxons will next play in a tri-match in Dallas, PA when they head to Misericordia University on Saturday, October 19. They begin with a 3 p.m. match against Immaculata University and then a 5 p.m. start against the hosts.