The Brandeis women’s volleyball team lost its season home opener on Sept. 13 against the Bates College Bobcats. Though the teams alternated who was in the lead many times during each set, the Judges were unable to win. The Bobcats took the match with a score of 3–1. The set, scores were 25–17, 24–26, 27–25 and 25–19. 

The Bobcats jumped to a quick lead in the first set pulling ahead to a score of 7–1, and though the Judges fought back, they were never able to overcome the initial Bobcat surge. In the second set, it was the Judges who started off strong, taking a giant 9–1 lead. Though the Bobcats battled back and eventually took over the lead, the Judges would not accept defeat and took the lead again on a kill by Emma Bartlett ’20 and a block by Amelia Oppenheimer ’23. Finally, an Oppenheimer kill and two errors on the part of  the Bobcats allowed the Judges to win the second set. During the third set, the Judges came close to having an amazing comeback from a 7–0 deficit due to all around hard play. The Judges clawed their way back to a score of 16–13 on the service of Belle Scott ’21. The Bobcats fought back, but the Judges held on to tie the set at 20-all. However, after the two teams battled back and forth, with the Judges surviving two to set points, the Bobcats were able to win on two Judges’ attacking errors by a score of 27–25. In the fourth set, the two teams battled back fourth fairly evenly even though the Bobcats held a three point lead most of the time. However, when the score was 21–19, the Bobcats finished the set with four points in a row to win with a score of 25–19. 

On Sept. 14, Brandeis participated in a tri-match at Amherst against the Amherst College Mammoths and the Worcester State Lancers. The Judges broke their six-match losing streak by beating the Lancers 25–19, 25–6, 25–6. However, in the second match they lost to the Mammoths 25–13, 25–10, 25–15.

In the first match the Judges came out hot with 31 kills, 81 total attacks and a hitting percentage of .296. Belle Scott ’21 was on fire and led the Judges with a .579 hitting percentage, 12 kills and one error. Emma Bartlett ’20 also contributed to the team with nine kills and two blocks Marissa Borgert ’21 had eight kills and eight assists, and Talia Freud ’23 had 17 assists and eight digs, a career high. After the first match, the team looked unstoppable.

Unfortunately, in the next match against the Mammoths, the Judges couldn’t hold onto their offensive domination. From the start of the match, the Mammoths never let up, answering the Judges’ every attempt to put together a successful point run. Bartlett led this match with eight kills, Scott followed with seven kills, Kaitlyn Oh ’22 had 12 digs, Freud had 13 assists and Avery Donovan ’22 added three blocks with one of them a solo.

The Judges are now 2–7 for the season. Their next opponents are the top-ranked Emory University Eagles — a University Athletic Association competitor — the #10 Carnegie Mellon Scotties and the University of Rochester Yellowjackets in the first of three University Athletic Association Round Robin held on Sept. 22 at home in the Gosman Sports and Convocation Center.