LYNN — The Lynn English volleyball team brought visiting Somerville to the brink Monday but it wasn’t enough for the Bulldogs to end up on top in a 3-1 loss. English lost by set scores of 8-25, 23-25, 25-15 and 15-25.
“I don’t know what happened in that first set,” English coach Mike Haddad said. “I don’t know if we were awake. But I’ll tell you, they came back strong in that second set. Obviously any loss is tough but seeing how close they made that game, I was just excited watching them build momentum from the second set into the third. They really earned that third set.”
Veronica Moeun had a monster game for English with five aces, three blocks and two kills.
“Veronica, I thought, played an amazing game,” Haddad said. “I thought this was one of her strongest performances as a middle, a really, really strong outing for her.”
Merily Folestal also played well with seven kills, five blocks and four aces. Kasey Nguyen and Heady Acosta both played well defensively with Nguyen tallying three kills. DJ Chim also had four aces
“Merily continues to be one the most consistent middle players that I have,” Haddad said. “She’s always ready to play. And Heady and Kasey were our best receivers (Monday).”
English fell behind 6-1 early in the first set. The Bulldogs put together a small rally thanks to three aces from Chim to cut the lead to 7-5 but it was all Somerville from there.
English was ready to play in the second set. Moeun ripped off three early aces of her own to give English its own 6-1 lead early. Somerville rallied back and grabbed a 16-10 lead later but a kill from Chim followed by two aces by Folestal and another from Diamond Bogues helped English cut the lead to 19-18 down the stretch. Both teams traded points from there but it was Somerville that made a few more plays down the stretch to go up 2-0.
Despite the big hole, English carried momentum into the third set. With Moeun at the service line the Bulldogs grabbed a 6-0 lead before a Somerville timeout. Somerville rallied back again and both teams went back and forth leading to a 15-15 tie.
The Bulldogs were unstoppable from there, with Moeun back at the service line leading a 10-point run. A hard kill from Folestale capped off the Bulldogs win and cut the lead to 2-1.
But that momentum didn’t last the rest of the way. English fell behind 11-5 in the fourth set and despite a few rallies Somerville locked up the win.
“Consistency is going to be our downfall and once we get it that’s going to be the thing to elevate this team,” Haddad said. “In the fourth we’d start to come back and then we’d have a service error or an attack error. Bad things happen but when they kill your momentum, it can be hard to come back from especially in a close set.”
English has been making nice strides over its last few games, but with the shortened season already almost over Haddad and company may not get to see the final product they normally would.
“I’m happy and I’m sad because we’re just starting to gel as a team and we have two games left,” Haddad said. “If we had a full season I think we’d see a really big turnaround in the midpoint of the season. All we can do is end the season strong against Everett and Classical the best we can and then have our eyes on next season because most of these girls we’ll be back in the fall.”
English hosts Everett Wednesday (5:30).
