Basketball
The NYU men’s basketball team traveled to Jamaica, Queens on Saturday to play the City University of New York, York College and won 112-56.
The Violets had an early first-half lead of 61-12, and three players scored double-digit points in the game. Junior Bryan Moussako scored 14 points, and sophomore Hampton Sanders scored 12. Graduate student Josh Menard had 8 points, sophomore Jonathan Sigurdsson ended the game with 9 and graduate student Brock Susko led the Violets with 20 points.
Saturday’s win added a fourth to NYU’s undefeated record. They will play the State University of New York, Farmingdale in Farmingdale, NY on Tuesday.
The women’s basketball team beat the Colby College Mules on Sunday at the Paulson Center.
Senior Belle Pellecchia and graduate student Natalie Bruns both scored 20 points, leading the Violets to their 90-56 win. NYU was ahead the whole game, with a 7-0 run in the third quarter giving them a 21-point lead.
The Violets’ record is 5-0 and they will take the court again on Dec. 6 against SUNY Cobleskill.
Cross Country
The No. 6-ranked men’s and women’s cross-country teams finished their 2024 season as the fifth and fourth best teams, respectively, in the NCAA Division III National Championships this past Saturday, Nov. 23 at the LaVern Gibson Cross Country Course in Terre Haute, IN.
The teams’ fourth and fifth-placed finishes meant NYU posted the best combined finish of any cross-country program.
Junior Janie Cooper led the women’s team in the 6K with a 14th-place finish at 21:23.4 and junior Lucy Gott placed 39th at 21:46.4, which earned them both NCAA All-American honors.
In the men’s 8K event, senior Ryan Tobin — who has qualified for the NCAA Championships in each of his four years at NYU — led the Violets’ pack with a 24:33.3 in 26th place, the only All-American finisher for NYU.
Graduate student Evan Sherman, junior Jeffrey Chen and sophomore Liam Hagerty finished within two seconds of one other in 44th, 45th and 48th place, respectively.
Soccer
The women’s soccer team’s season ended Saturday, with a 1-2 loss against Johns Hopkins University in the NCAA D-III Tournament’s Sweet 16 round.
The Blue Jays came out with a 2-0 lead by halftime, and although the Violets played stronger in the second half, the team was unable to catch up. First-year Julia Spang scored the Violets’ lone goal off of graduate student Kelli Keady’s cross in the 67th minute.
Graduate student and goalkeeper Riley Felsher tipped a Johns Hopkins shot straight up and over the goal, and she ended the game with four saves and her collegiate career with 128 shots saved.
Both teams had a goal deemed offside, with NYU’s coming from senior Izze Ching with 10 minutes to go in the second half.
The team ended its season 12-3-6, ranked second in its region. This marked the third time in program history that the Violets made the third round of the tournament.
Swimming & Diving
The men’s and women’s swimming & diving teams won the 15th annual Phoenix Invitational in Chicago, IL over the Nov. 22-24 weekend.
The women’s team began the invitational on day one with a 200-yard freestyle relay win from sophomore Hope Xayaveth, senior Isabel Oldham, first-year Natsuki Uchino and junior Kaley McIntyre, breaking the program record with a time of 1:33.21. McIntyre also won the 50-yard freestyle with a 22.86 time. Senior Caitlin Marshall won the 500-yard freestyle, and sophomore Calista Lynch won the 200-yard individual medley.
On day two, Lynch won the 400-yard individual medley while Xayaveth broke the team’s oldest swimming record with a 54.47 time in the 100-yard butterfly, placing first.
Junior Nicole Ranile won the 100-yard backstroke at 54.70 and first-year Katherine Taylor was the Violets’ highest finisher in the dives, placing fourth with a 433.95 score.
Xayaveth won the 100-yard butterfly with a program record time of 54.47 on day three, while Anna Li broke the program record in the 100-yard breaststroke with a 1:03.25 time.
Sophomores Pierce Downs, Stone Miller and Greg Wehbe along with junior Leo Han placed third in the 200-yard freestyle relay to start day one for the men’s team. First-year Maksym Nechydyuk won the 200-yard individual medley, and senior Connor Vincent won the 500-yard freestyle for the Violets at 4:23.56, a personal best.
On day two, Vincent clinched another victory in the freestyle, this time in the 200-yard event. First-year Teddy McQuaid won the 100-yard backstroke with an impressive 48.08 time.
In the dives, senior William Hopkins placed third in the three-meter dive with a score of 443.
Vincent broke the program record in the 500-yard freestyle with a 4:23.56 time, while the 800-yard freestyle relay team of first-year Maksym Nechydyuk, Vincent, sophomore Kevin Wu and Downs won the event and broke the record with a 6:33.90 time.
Next, the men’s and women’s swimming teams will travel to Ewing, NJ on Dec. 7 to compete in a meet against The College of New Jersey and Johns Hopkins, while the diving teams will compete in the Go Red Diving Invitational hosted by Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute over the same weekend in Troy, NY.
Volleyball
The women’s volleyball traveled to Cambridge, MA to compete in the first three rounds of the NCAA D-III Championship after receiving an at-large bid — chosen for the tournament instead of placing into it — following a sixth-place finish in the UAA tournament.
The Violets won a slow first set against William Smith College 25-22. The team dropped the second set 22-25, but gradually found its rhythm, dominating the third set 25-15 and closing out the match 25-18. First-year Chloe Hynes finished the match with 12 kills and sophomore Grace Nelson followed with 11. Junior setter Ava Launsbach put up 23 assists, and graduate student and libero Yooni Park completed 25 digs.
NYU advanced to the next round to play host the Massachusetts Institute of Technology but fell in four sets — 17-25, 25-21, 19-25, 20-25 — to end their season.
The Engineers won a close first set with a 6-2 run, but the Violets came back from down 14-17 to rally and win the second set with an 11-4 run. However, the Violets were playing catch-up for most of the following two sets to lose the match.
NYU finished its season 22-13 — 4-6 in conference — with its fourth-straight appearance in the NCAA tournament, and the program’s fourth-straight second round appearance. The men’s volleyball season begins Jan. 17 in Chicago, IL against the Illinois Institute of Technology.
Wrestling
The No. 21-ranked Violets split its wrestling team this weekend to compete in two events: the New York State Collegiate Championships in Oneonta, NY and a matchup against No. 5-ranked Johnson & Wales University at the Paulson Center, both of which took place on Saturday, Nov. 23.
In Oneonta, NYU placed 12th of 20 teams, accumulating 60 points. First-year James Carlock advanced to the finals of the 133-lb weight class competition, losing to Division-I Hofstra University’s Ryan Arbeit in the final.
Sophomore Rex Jacops and first-year Alex Kaufmann faced each other in the fifth-placed match for the 165-lb competition, which Jacops won by fall over. Junior Andrew DeSola placed fifth in the 141-lb class and first-year Neale Pathak placed sixth in the 125-lb class.
At Paulson, the Violets lost for the second time this season in a 19-20 meet against Johnson & Wales.
Sophomore Jacob Venezia, junior Nicky Bell, senior Cooper Pontelandolfo and graduate student Trent Furman won their bouts in their respective weight classes, but the Wildcats won its last two bouts to clinch the victory.
The entire wrestling team will travel to Bristol, RI for their last meet this season to compete in the Roger Williams Duals against Roger Williams University, Rhode Island College and Western New England University on Saturday, Dec. 7.
Contact Jonathan and Sidney at [email protected].
