WILKES-BARRE, PA (February 4, 2023) -- The King's College men's volleyball team continued its winning ways on Saturday afternoon as they improved to 10-0 for the season with 3-0 wins over Wilson College and Russell Sage College in McGrane Gymnasium. With the split, Wilson improves to 1-2, while Russell Sage drops to 3-5.
 
vs. Wilson – W, 3-0 (25-10, 25-15, 25-11):
After Wilson (1-2) recorded the first point of the match, King's (10-0) opened the scoring to go on a 12-4 run to take a 12-5 advantage over the Phoenix. The Monarchs would continue to click as a team to cruise to a 25-10 win in the opening set of the day.
 
The visitors started the second set strong to stay even with King's, sitting at an 8-8 tie, but the Monarchs would find their momentum to rattle off the next six points of the set to go ahead, 14-8, on their way to the 25-15 win in the set.
 
The final set of the match saw King's jump out to an early 7-0 edge behind two kills and a block from junior Jared Piontkowski. Wilson would not come within six the remainder of the set as the Monarchs defeated the Phoenix, 25-11, to win the match, 3-0.
 
Piontkowski led King's with 12 kills on 22 attempts and just two errors to hit .455 for the match, adding eight digs, three blocks, and an ace. Senior Sam Capwell posted six kills on eight attempts with no errors to hit .750, adding four blocks, while the junior duo of Peter Scholl and Nick Greenawalt tallied five kills as Greenawalt also added four blocks. Senior Joe Herman paced the defense with 10 digs, while first year Ben Maskiell dished out 15 helpers with four digs. Additionally, first year Owen McFadden recorded a team-high five blocks in the win.
 
Wilson was paced by a seven-kill, seven-dig effort from Xavier Webber, while Jonathan Minnick recorded 19 assists.
 
King's was extremely efficient in their opening match, hitting .449 (36-69) with just five attack errors, while the Monarchs limited Wilson to a .025 (22-80) hitting percentage and 20 errors. The Monarchs held the edge in every statistical category, including kills (36-22), aces (6-5), blocks (10-3), assists (29-22), and digs (35-24).
 
vs. Russell Sage – W, 3-0 (25-8, 25-13, 25-5):
After a tough match up with Wilson in their previous game of the day, the visiting Russell Sage (3-5) saw King's use a dominant 19-6 run to start the match to work their way to a 25-8 win in the opening set. It was much of the same story in set two, with the Monarchs jumping ahead 16-6 before winning the second, 25-13, to take the 2-0 lead in the match. The hosts cruised in the final set of the day, leading 12-1 early and never looking back as they earned the third set win, 25-5, and the match, 3-0, over the Gators.
 
Piontkowski led King's yet again with 11 kills, adding four digs and four blocks, while Herman had a solid game of five kills, 10 digs, and an ace. Scholl also performed well with five kills on six attempts to hit .833, while Greenawalt went 4-for-5 with a .800 hitting percentage. Senior George Beck tallied five digs to go along with nine assists and three aces, and Maskiell dished out 17 helpers. Additionally, both Capwell and McFadden added five blocks each, and first year Greg Bousquet posted four.
 
The Gators were led by Elijah Tortoici with six kills, while Jack McWilliam totaled six digs.
 
King's was efficient yet again in the match, hitting .474 (33-57) with only six attack errors, and their defense limited Russell Sage to a -.143 hitting percentage with 25 errors. Inside the stat sheet, the Monarchs held the edge in kills (33-15), aces (7-1), blocks (11-0), assists (29-15), and digs (30-17).
 
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King's will enjoy the week off as they prepare for their weekend trip to Massachusetts where they will take on American International College on Friday at 6:30 p.m. before heading over to Dean College for a tri-match with Dean and Northern Vermont-Johnson set to begin at 1:00 p.m. in Franklin, MA.