A pair of sweeps and a five-set defeat marred the Brandeis Invitational for the women's volleyball team, held this past Friday and Saturday in the Gosman Sports and Convocation Center. 

The squad began its annual home opener with a sweep at the hands of the United States Coast Guard Academy on Friday before closing the tournament with losses to Wesleyan College and Wellesley College on Saturday.

Middle blocker Carly Gutner-Davis ’15 took home all-tournament honors for the Judges with a pair of strong performances on Saturday afternoon. 

After sitting out of Friday’s match, Gutner-Davis recorded four kills, three blocks and an assist against Wesleyan, and added five kills in the Wellesley match.

Coach Alesia Vaccari said that even though the team went through some early-season troubles, her team will use the losses as extra motivation in practice.

“The [team] is excited to come into practice this week and get better each day,” she said. 

“It was a tough weekend because we hung with the [other] teams, but we need to finish better.”

Although the Judges were swept by a score of 25-22, 25-16, 25-18 in the final match of the tournament, they kept the match close against Wellesley on Saturday afternoon. 

Outside hitter Liz Hood ’15 capped an impressive offensive weekend with seven kills against Wellesley and snapped out of some offensive woes from the season’s first three games. 

Hood, last year’s University Athletic Association leader in kills, began the year with four kills through the first three games and added 28 this past weekend, including 17 against Wesleyan. 

“We're going to work hard to keep [Hood’s] shoulder healthy during the season,” Vaccari said, pointing out it was “great” to have the outside hitter return to her offensive dominance.

Vaccari noted that the while presence of a healthy Hood helped turn points in favor of the Judges, it does not make up for an awarness on the court.

“We need to work hard to be smarter volleyball playes and that will come in practice,” she said.

Defensive specialist Elsie Bernaiche ’15 led the defense with a game-high 12 digs against Wellesley but was one of just four Judges to record a dig. 

Seven of the eight members of the Wellesley squad recorded a dig during the sweep.

Though the outcome was ultimately the same, the loss against Wesleyan earlier on Saturday went the full five sets, as the Judges fell 25-16, 26-24, 23-25, 23-25, 15-12. 

The Judges were outplayed in the first set but improved as the match went on, dropping the second set by two points and taking the third and fourth sets. The team could not pull off the comeback victory though, losing the tie-breaking fifth set.

Middle blocker Maddie Engeler ’16 complimented Hood’s match-high 17 kills with 12 of her own and added a pair of blocks as well. Setter Julie Kim ’18 eclipsed a career high with 48 assists, a handful better than the 35 she recorded in the squad’s season-opening game on Aug. 29. 

On Friday, the team scuffled to a 25-21, 27-25, 25-5 defeat to Coast Guard. 10 members of the squad recorded either a kill or a dig, with six Judges recording at least one in each category. 

Bernaiche led the Judges with 10 digs and a kill and added a pair of assists. She leads the squad with 104 digs this year.

“Friday night we played two really good matches, but in volleyball a team needs to play more than two good matches to be successful,” Vaccari said.

“We're learning more about each other and how to win [as a team],” she continued.

Kim turned in the most complete performance of her collegiate career against Wellesley with a trio of kills, four digs and 26 assists. Engeler and middle blocker Summer Koop ’16 both contributed seven kills for the squad, while outside hitter Jessie Moore ’18 added six of her own.

Vaccari noted that the squad is still looking to fine tune their identity as a team.

“[The team is] learning how to put the ball on the other team so that they make the mistakes and not us,” she said. 

“We are building from that [principle] each day in practice.

“We are still trying to get into a rhythm of our identity as a team—what we're going to [focus on] doing well as a team."

The Judges will look to return to the win column when they travel to the Trinity College Invitational in Hartford, Conn. this weekend. 

The squad opens the invitational against host Trinity on Friday evening before squaring off against Eastern Connecticut State University and Western New England University on Saturday, beginning at 11 a.m.