Loudonville, NY- For the third straight year, No. 2 Quinnipiac and No. 1 Fairfield played one another in the MAAC Championship, and for a second straight year, the Stags won 3-1 over the Bobcats.
“We got to work harder,” said Quinnipiac’s head coach Kyle Robinson. “To get here is just not good enough. You’ve got to get here and finish the job.”
This was a game of errors for Quinnipiac. The Bobcats gave up over a set’s worth of service errors with 35, while the Stags committed 19.
“We missed a ton of serves at really bad spots,” said Robinson. “We passed awfully. We’ve normally been passing great, but even in warm-ups, you can see it. We just weren’t great.”
While Quinnipiac showed up to the semifinals the day before full of energy and ready to play, Sunday’s game was almost the opposite for the Bobcats.
“We didn’t play anywhere close to one of our good matches, let alone our best match,” said Robinson. “I don’t think it would have taken our best match to beat these guys, but we needed to play our type of volleyball, which we didn’t do tonight.”
The first set started with an 11-8 run for the Stags. The Bobcats called a timeout to try and bring themselves together, but it was to no success. Fairfield continued to dominate the rest of the first set and finished Quinnipiac off 25-14.
Quinnipiac kept the second set closer but never took the lead. Fairfield started right where they left off in the first set, and kept the momentum going. While the Bobcats were able to tie it a few times, they would still have to wait to get their first lead of the game.
In the third set, the Bobcats saw a switch up in their starting lineup. Robinson decided to put in junior middle blocker Milena Silva. As soon as Silva stepped on the court, Quinnipiac looked like a new team. Silva played the final two sets and ended the game with four kills and two blocks.
“I have a lot of faith in Milena,” said Robinson. “She’s got a big arm. I was hoping that maybe that would spark it a little bit.”
The energy from day one was back as the Bobcats held their biggest lead of seven points over the Stags during the third set. It was like deja vu from last year’s MAAC finals, where the Bobcats lost the first two sets and then went on to win the third to push it to four.
While Quinnipiac hoped that this year’s MAAC Championship would have a different ending, Fairfield showed why they were the reigning champs in the fourth set.
The Stags went on a 12-8 run to start the set and caused the Bobcats to call a timeout. With their season fleeting, Quinnipiac tried to shorten the Stags lead but was unsuccessful. Fairfield went on an 8-3 run and junior middle blocker Maya Walker sent the final dagger down to win the MAAC Championship.
“They [Quinnipiac] had a good season,” said Robinson. “They fought well most of the season. I don’t think we fought great here tonight, but most of the season I thought we were fighting and competing well for the logo.”
Despite the loss, both Quinnipiac’s Elena Giacomini and Yagmur Gunes were named to the All-Tournament Team. Giacomini finished the tournament with 52 kills, while Gunes had 35 kills.
“To see Lonnie (Leilani-Kai Giusta) and Yaya (Yagmur Gunes) carry us the whole season on the left side is a defining moment because that’s great things to come,” said Robinson. “Hopefully they take the pain and the lessons learned here to be better for next year.”
Fairfield will move on to the NCAA tournament and find out who their opponent will be on Dec. 5.
