UTICA, NY – The SUNYIT women's volleyball team picked up a pair of 3-0 victories over local rival Utica College in non-conference action at the Campus Center Gymnasium Saturday.  The Lady Wildcats are now 2-0 on the year, while Utica fell to 0-2.

SUNYIT was originally set to host a tri-match with Utica and Paul Smith's College, but was forced to reschedule and play Utica twice due to a last-minute cancellation by Paul Smith's.  No makeup dates with Paul Smith's College have been announced as of this writing.

After rolling to a 25-10 game-one victory during match one, the Lady Wildcats found themselves tied with Utica at 16 all in game two, but were eventually able to pull away and pick up a hard-fought 25-20 win.  Utica again came out strong in game three, taking a 12-8 lead to force a SUNYIT timeout.  The Wildcats were able to regroup, however, rallying to tie the game at 14 before finishing off Utica 25-17.

Junior Juleah Vedder (Dolgeville, NY/Dolgeville) posted a double-double of 15 kills and 10 digs in the victory, while freshman Kaitlyn Harrington (Central Square, NY/Paul V. Moore) had 15 kills and six digs.  Senior Nicole Higgins (Sellersville, PA/Pennridge) tallied 26 assists, while freshman Taviot Jackowski (LaFayette, NY/LaFayette) had 15 assists.

Heather Jackson and Aundrea Dorie each had five kills for Utica, while Chelsie Petras had 11 assists.

The Wildcats rolled through match two, hitting .352 as a team and registering 34 kills en route to winning by the scores of 25-7, 25-13 and 25-12.  Harrington had a match-high 10 kills to go along with three serve aces, while Vedder had eight kills to leave her just 16 shy of 1,000 career kills.  Higgins finished with 13 assists and seven digs, while Jackowski tallied 20 assists and senior Courtney Ruether (Allegany, NY/Allegany-Limestone) registered a team-high seven digs.

The Wildcats will next compete at the SUNY Potsdam Tournament, which will be held on Friday, September 10 and Saturday, September 11.  They will first take on St. Lawrence at 6:00 pm on Friday before squaring off against RIT at 8:00 pm, followed by Oswego at 1:00 pm and Plattsburgh at 3:00 pm on Saturday.