The women’s volleyball team dropped a pair of matches over the weekend, falling to Amherst and Tufts by 3-0 scores. However, weekend losses by Bates, Bowdoin, and Colby allowed the team to clinch a spot in the NESCAC tournament. Wesleyan then returned home on Wednesday for senior night and made it back into the win column with a 3-0 victory over Eastern Connecticut State University (ECSU).

Wesleyan traveled to Amherst on Friday for a pair of conference matches. Up first were the host Lord Jeffs, whom Wesleyan had previously conquered in the Wesleyan Invitational, 3-2, for Amherst’s only loss of the year. This time, however, Amherst turned the tables with a 3-0 win. The Jeffs won the first two games 30-24 and earned a 30-26 victory in the third while racking up a .184 hitting percentage, a significant improvement over their .128 percentage in the previous meeting. On the other hand, Wesleyan managed only a .083 hitting percentage, its lowest of the season and well below its .230 percentage in the first match.

“I think that both teams are very compatible.” said tri-captain Jettie Word ’08. “It’s just a matter of who steps up in the moment, and Amherst seemed to do that [on Friday]… We played a really good game, we just didn’t have enough focus.”

This is the fourth consecutive year that the teams have split the first two matches. In 2006, Wesleyan defeated Amherst in NESCAC play, 3-2, but fell to the Lord Jeffs in the Wesleyan Invitational two weeks later, 3-0. Wesleyan also won the first match in 2005, with Amherst the victor in 2004.

Wesleyan then took on Tufts on Saturday afternoon. The Jumbos eked out a 32-30 win in the first game before rolling to 30-22 wins in the next two for their fifth sweep of the Cardinals in the last eight meetings. Word believes that the narrow loss in the first game dealt a devastating blow to the Cardinals.

“I think it definitely contributed to our lack of focus on the court and to the way we played,” Word said.

Historically, Wesleyan has had its hands full with the three NESCAC teams from Massachusetts. Since the NESCAC became a playing conference in 2000, Wesleyan is just 17-29 overall against Amherst, Tufts, and Williams; the Cardinals are 58-23 against the rest of the NESCAC during the same time period.

The Cardinals returned to Middletown for their final home match of the season against ECSU. The team’s three seniors, Word, Caroline Rober ’08, and Becca Rodger ’08, were honored before the game. For the second consecutive year, the seniors went out with a 3-0 win. Wesleyan rolled to a 30-15 win in the first game. With the Warriors leading 6-5 early, Wesleyan scored 13 of the next 14 points to take an 18-7 lead. The Warriors did not score more than two consecutive points the rest of the game. Wesleyan scored six of the last eight for the win.

The second game opened with a service ace by Wesleyan, which jumped out to a 12-3 lead. The Warriors scored consecutive points only twice in the match, while Wesleyan recorded four more aces and at one point scored nine consecutive points along the way to a 30-12 win. The 12 points were the fewest allowed by Wesleyan in a non-tiebreaker since 2004 and the fewest ever against ECSU.

The Warriors jumped out to a 7-2 lead to open the third game, but Wesleyan scored six straight to take the lead. The teams alternated leads before Wesleyan scored six straight to take the lead for good, 17-11. The Cardinals scored the last three points of the game for a 30-22 win, securing their fourth straight 3-0 home victory. Wesleyan also avenged a 3-0 loss at ECSU from the 2006 season.

“This game was really important,” Word said. “This week is really important, even though it’s not a NESCAC week, just to get ready for our next really big week and resume our winning streak and playing how we know we can.”

Wesleyan is now 14-5 overall and sits at 4-3 in the NESCAC, tied for fifth place with Tufts. The team has also clinched a spot in the NESCAC tournament, in which it has participated every year since the tournament’s inception in 1990. Wesleyan will play its final nonconference matches of the season this Saturday, as the Cardinals travel to New London for matches against Coast Guard and Roger Williams for the 10th straight season. Wesleyan will look to break its three-game losing streak against Coast Guard and improve its all-time record against Roger Williams to 15-0.