(ELIZABETHTOWN, Pa.) – The Randolph-Macon men's volleyball team made history with its two sweeps on Saturday as the victories guaranteed the Yellow Jackets a winning record for the first time in program history. The Yellow Jackets opened up the day with a CVC win against Elizabethtown before rolling against Neumann later in the afternoon.

The Basics

Scores: Randolph-Macon 3, Elizabethtown 0 (25-21, 25-13, 28-26)
Randolph-Macon 3, Neumann 0 (25-16, 25-12, 25-16)

Venue: Thompson Gymnasium

Records: Randolph-Macon 15-7, 3-4 CVC
Elizabethtown 12-10, 2-5 CVC
Neumann 7-12

How It Happened (Match 1 vs. Elizabethtown)

• The Lemon and Black trailed early after a 4-0 run gave the hosts a 13-10 lead, but the Jackets responded in a big way with an 8-1 run to claim control. Four of the points were scored on kills by Kolby Gibson (Jr., Bumpass, Va. / Louisa), Drew Klein (So., Glen Allen, Va. / Glen Allen), Jarrett Carrano (Jr., Beaverdam, Va. / Patrick Henry), and Sean Cunningham (Jr., Virginia Beach, Va. / Kempsville). Cunningham and Klein also paired together to block a Blue Jay attack during the rally.
• The Blue Jays stayed close and got back to within one on a few occasions, but the Jackets closed out the set with four of the last five points. Gibson started off the run with a kill and Gio DeLuca (So., Glen Allen, Va. / Glen Allen) added an ace later.
• The Jackets started dominating early in the second and jumped out to a 9-2 lead. R-MC kept building upon the lead as the hosting Jays could only muster consecutive points once during the set. The Jackets proceeded to take the 2-0 lead with the final four points, three of which were on kills from Gibson, Merrick Gessler (Sr., Virginia Beach, Va. / Frank W. Cox), and Owen Hahn (Fr., Henrico, Va. / Tucker).
• The Jackets had to work for the win in the third as it required extra points to put away Elizabethtown. R-MC played for match point up 24-22, but the Jays were able to come back and serve for game point. An error on the aforementioned serve put the advantage back to the Jackets who scored the next point to go up 26-25. Elizabethtown scored the next point to even the set at 26-all, but another service error and a Klein kill gave the Jackets the match.

Inside The Numbers (Match 1 vs. Elizabethtown)

• Klein led the attack with a co-match high honors on 12 kills. Elizabethtown's Black Hildebrand also put down 12 attacks.
• The Jackets had one of their best hitting percentages in a game in the second with an astronomical mark of .688 on 11 kills.
• While they cooled down some in the third, the Jackets still managed 17 of their 25 points on kills.
• Cade Terrell (So., Glen Allen, Va. / Deep Run) set up the attack with 31 assists. He set up three players with at least eight kills and four with at least five.
• John Saxman (So., Henrico, Va. / Mills Godwin) led the team defensively receiving with nine digs. Gibson and Carrano added eight each.
• Up front R-MC was once again led by Cunningham who blocked three attacks, one of which was by himself.

How It Happened (Match 2 vs. Neumann)

• An 8-1 helped the Jackets create some separation in the first set and gave them a 20-11 lead over the Knights. Mitchell Wyatt (Fr., Prince George, Va. / Prince George) led the charge with two kills during the rally while James Manning (Jr., Glen Allen, Va. / Glen Allen) was just getting heated up with one. Later in the game Manning scored three more kills, the last of which made the score 23-15. The Jackets ended up taking two of the last three points for the win.
• The second game was even more one-sided in favor of R-MC. Three consecutive aces by Gessler put the score at 11-5, and the Jackets got stronger from there. They ended up closing the game with the final six points to take a 2-0 lead.
• In the third, R-MC jumped out to an 8-3 lead after a pair of Scotty Carter (Sr., Virginia Beach, Va. / Frank W. Cox) kills. Again the Jackets got stronger as the set went on, especially in the middle to late stages. With the score 16-13, R-MC closed out the day emphatically with nine of the last 12 points. Five of them were on kills with Kyle Alberici (Sr., Cicero, N.Y. / Cicero North Syracuse) scoring three of them.

Inside The Numbers

• The offense was on fire for R-MC as it hit .435 for the match to set a new program record. It's the first time in program history the Jackets hit over .400 for a match.
• The Jackets accomplished the feat with 36 kills on 62 attempts with just nine errors. Gessler set up the attack with 27 assists. Carter led the offense with 10 kills.
• On the opposite end the Jackets kept the Knights' offense stifled with a success rate of .043. Cunningham added three more blocks and Alberici added eight digs.

Up Next

Another CVC contest awaits the Jackets as they head to Immaculata for an 11 a.m. start Sunday.