On Saturday, the New York University men's volleyball team, currently ranked #1 in the nation by the American Volleyball Coaches Association (AVCA), suffered its first loss of the 2020 season to United Volleyball Conference (UVC) rival #10 St. John Fisher College (SJFC) at NYU's Brooklyn Athletic Facility.

The Violets took the first two sets by scores of 25-22 and 27-25 while SJFC took the last three sets, 25-22, 27-25, 19-17.

NYU (12-1,3-1) scored first in the first set and went on to take its biggest lead, 14-7. But SJFC (13-2, 2-1) rallied for the next six points to bring them back within one. NYU again increased its lead to five points on two occasions before grabbing the three-point win.  

The second set was tight throughout as neither team led by more than four points the entire way. Tied 25-25, NYU scored the final two points of the match, clinching the victory on a pair of errors by SJFC.

The Cardinals scored first in the third set and raced out to an early 10-6 lead. However, the Violets fought back with the next three points to cut into the deficit. The squads locked things up on seven occasions before SJFC secured the two-point win.

The Violets took their biggest lead of the fourth set, 17-13, thanks to a Matin Bikdeli (Irvine, CA/University) service ace. However, the Cardinals battled back to take the 26-24 victory and force a fifth set.

In the final set, the teams traded one-point advantages throughoutFinally, with the score tied 17-17, SJFCs' Josh Bigford's kill and an attack error by Alex Li (Cupertino, CA/Monta Vista) the closed out the scoring for the day.

NYU saved a total of seven match points in the final set. 

Bikdeli's (Irvine, CA/University) 50 assists controlled a Violet attack which hit .219 for the match.

"This was our weakest match of the season," said Head Coach Jose Pina. " I think this is lowest we hit the whole year, the only other time we were out-hit this year was back at UC Santa Cruz."

Evan Lindley (Evanston, IL/Evanston Township) led NYU with 18 kills while Li contributed 16.

"SJFC out-hit us in set five which had a lot to do with us not converting our attacks and not putting away balls after digs," added Pina. "We have to give credit to SJFC. They came ready to play and there are no easy matches in the UVC."     

The top-ranked Violets return to their Brooklyn court on Monday, March 2, for a match against North Central College. First serve is set for 7:00pm