Eagles Travel to Syracuse, Virginia Tech to Continue ACC Play

CHESTNUT HILL, Mass. – The Boston College volleyball team continues ACC play this week with a pair of road matches, traveling to Syracuse on Wednesday before taking on Virginia Tech on Sunday.

Last weekend, the Eagles fell in four sets to No. 22 Louisville on Friday evening before dropping another four-set contest to Notre Dame on Sunday afternoon. In both matches, BC came out strong to win the first frame but couldn't sustain the momentum through the length of the match.

"Volleyball is a very momentum-driven sport and we weren't able to hang on to it," said head coach Jason Kennedy. "We got blown out pretty good in the second set against Notre Dame and I liked the way we battled back to kind of close the gap a little bit in the next two sets but when we get off to the starts we do, we have to be able to reset and come back out with the same intensity that we did to start the match."

Syracuse is 13-7 on the season and tied for fourth in the ACC at 9-3 after defeating No. 22 Louisville in five sets on Sunday and dropping a three-set contest to Notre Dame. Senior Santita Ebangwese leads the ACC with a .407 attack percentage while freshman Polina Shemanova's 4.43 kills per set also lead the conference. As a team, the Orange average 2.96 blocks per set, the highest in the league.

"Syracuse is one of the most physical teams in the conference. They're one of the biggest blocking teams, they're probably the biggest block that we'll have seen all year so we're kind of gearing up for that. We know that we're going to have to choose smart shots when we attack, we're going to move the ball around a good amount to keep them guessing.

Virginia Tech tied for eighth in the league at 4-8 and is 13-11 overall in 2018. The Hokies are coming off a pair of 3-0 losses to Miami and Florida State last weekend. Tech averages just 1.99 blocks per set, the third-lowest in the ACC.

"Virginia Tech is a team that really seems to have figured some things out. Their record probably isn't as good as they want it to be, but they play teams close and they're in a lot of these matches just like we are. It'll be a good test to see what it's like when we go down there on Sunday, we get them again in a couple weeks so we want to learn as much as we can while we're out there.

The last four matches of the regular season are rematches for BC, starting with the Eagles hosting Louisville on Nov. 9. The Eagles will face Virginia Tech in Power Gym on Nov. 16, then welcome Virginia on Nov. 21 and then finish out the regular season slate with a trip to Clemson on Nov. 23.

"This weekend is the last week that we're going to see teams for the first time. We haven't seen Syracuse yet this year, we haven't seen Virginia Tech this year. But after that it is teams we have seen earlier in the season. We're going to have a little bit of a better idea of what we needed to do better in some of those matches and what worked for us. We'll spend a little bit more time on each team based on what happened the first time around to see if we can make some changes to hopefully give us a shot to win or give us a shot to keep it close and see what happens."

First serve at Syracuse is set for 5 p.m. on Wednesday, Oct. 31 in the Women's Building while the Sunday, Nov. 4 match will be a 1 p.m. start. Both contests will be broadcast on ACC Network Extra.

Eagles Travel to Syracuse, Virginia Tech to Continue ACC Play

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