SPRINGFIELD, Massachusetts - In a match with the second seed in the upcoming 2026 Northeast 10 Conference Championship Tournament on the line,
Carissa Michel broke an NE10 record, leading the offense in a 25-23, 25-12, 25-23 victory against Adelphi University on Tuesday, November 3.
AIC is now 23-2 overall and 7-1 in the NE10.
The opening set was close early, although AIC was able to pull somewhat ahead down the stretch;
Victoria Mendez landed a kill, set up Michel, and then aced a serve for a 21-16 lead. Adelphi battled back and tied the match at 23-23, but Michel put AIC ahead and Mendez finished it off for the 25-23 win and 1-0 lead.
With the lead in hand, AIC went to work, and quickly built a 12-6 lead. Three blocks and three aces mixed into the Yellow Jacket score, forcing the Panthers to use both timeouts, but there were no answers found in the stoppages as AIC cruised to a 25-12 set win.
The Panthers had no intention of rolling over, and scrapped the whole way through the third set. AIC's margins were thin, but Michel kept landing kills at crucial times, and the difference across the set was a single aced serve and one fewer attack error in a 25-23 AIC win, with Mendez delivering the final blow on a setter attack that caught the defense between movements.
Michel's 19 kills with no errors were the most by a player in a single match in NE10 history, besting the previous high of 17 set by Pace University's Andreea Cotoranu on September 12, 2000 against Southern Connecticut State University. She hit .731 on the match, and also added two blocks, two assists, two aces, and 10 digs; she had no errors of any kind.Â
Mia Berdecia made 12 digs to lead the match, while Mendez dished 33 assists, along with making nine digs and four kills plus two aces.
Defne Aydin contributed nine kills, while
Janelys Perez Cortes had seven and was a perfect 17-of-17 receiving.Â
AIC has one remaining regular season match on Saturday, November 7 at noon at Saint Michael's College before returning to the Butova Gym for the NE10 Championship First Round on Tuesday, November 10. First serve time and opponent are still to be determined.Â
