On Thursday, Sept. 29, NECC Knights lost three sets to none against Bunker Hill Community College for a conference division game in Charlestown.

The Knights lost the first set 25-18, they lost the second set 25-21 and they lost the third set 25-19.

 The game was scheduled for 6 p.m. but the league changed it to 6:30 p.m. start time and the game officially started at 6:33.

The Bulldogs started off scoring the first three points of the game, a spike by Caroline Burns of Haverhill made sure that the Knights had their first point in the first set.

The Knights were looking for a comeback in the first set but it wasn’t enough as the Bulldogs defeated the Knights 25-18.

In the first set they were serving errors, spiking out of bounds and I felt they was not a lot of communication. Those mistakes caused the Knights to lose their first set.

After the game I interviewed NECC Women’s Volleyball head coach Mike Pelosi of Haverhill.

“Yeah I agree, one of the challenges for this group is just consistency and I mean serving I felt part of that was momentum and in rhythm we got to get kind of into a rhythm kind of get comfortable I think they were little intimidating by the crowd but just the consistency. We worked and it’s a challenging for me as a coach. I’m going to work with the assistant I may do some research solving this issue is the consistency piece. Take a breath before you serve do it well in practice and we do it for a little bit in the game and we stopped. Gets here attack position we do it will in practice and we do it good for a little bit in the game and then we stopped. Call the ball, same situation when you set the back row who ever is setting when you set the back row call the specific hitter because then it will avoid a communication problem in our end…” he said.

In the second set, few spikes by Burns put the Knights up early in the game.  

“Yeah, she was I love working with Caroline she always hustle and she set that internalization piece she does that great. You can see it as a coach when were doing drill I give her feedback and suggestion you can tell you can see their body language immediately puts it in practice and I love that and that’s why I think she is good as good she is. That’s why I think she continue to progress I’ve seen her progress a lot during the last month, so I am not surprised that she is killing it in a game,” Pelosi said.

Unfortunately the Bulldogs tied the game and coach Pelosi wanted a time out but it wasn’t granted by the officials.

The Knights were looking for a little come back, which they seemed to be achieving. The Knights were up 21 to 19, they just needed four more points to win the set.

Instead the Bulldogs went on a 6-0 run to finish the second set to defeat the Knights 25-21.

The Knights in the third set had an encore performance of Kathleen-Perez-Flores of Lowell scoring the first seven points in the third set while she was serving. On Tuesday, Sept. 27 against Quinsigamond she scored the first nine points to begin the second set.

Despite the Knights going on a 7-0 run the Bulldogs they just never gave up the Bulldogs were on a 5-1 run against the Knights.

It got pretty intense the Knights were eventually down for a few points but it was really close in the game.

The referee was explaining something to coach Pelosi. After the game he told me what the officials was saying to him “I wasn’t going to bring that up but since you ask that was another example of not doing the basic. We been running the same lineup this is at least four games with the same line up. The only changes we had, we had Heather (Walsh) serving sometimes but I think she done that for three games know. So, I think is three games with this exact same lineup and we screw up the line up the wrong person serve in free point and you know I think it was 19-21 that could’ve gone either way absolutely and you know we gave away a free point that something I didn’t cover as a coach because I thought that we had it down so as you probably know the momentum piece,  we fought well for most of the game and in that situation thinks like that can be critical in a tight game.  

The Knights eventually lost the third set 25-19 and got shutout by the Bulldogs three sets to none.