On Friday night in Ithaca, the women’s volleyball team (8-6, 3-2 Ivy) narrowly lost 3-1 to Ivy League leader Cornell (10-5, 5-0) in a thrilling matchup. Just one day later in New York City, the Bears throttled the Columbia Lions (2-13, 0-5) in a dominant 3-0 sweep.
One week ago, Brown delivered back-to-back victories against Princeton (9-4, 4-1) and Penn (7-8, 1-4). With momentum on their side, the Bears entered this weekend looking to make a statement against Cornell, which has gone undefeated in conference play this year.
“We compete hard every day in practice and talk a lot about mentality,” Head Coach Taylor Virtue wrote in an email to The Herald. “Our goal is to be the best possible version of ourselves, (and) we know that our best is good enough to beat anyone.”
From the opening serve on Friday, the two Ivy League titans dialed up the intensity. During the first set, the Bears and the Big Red fought hard for an early lead, matching each other’s kills, blocks and points. But nearly halfway through the set, they were still tied at 10-all.
Unfortunately for Bruno, the tide turned in the wrong direction after a controversial net call awarded Cornell a point, quickly snowballing into a 6-0 run for the Big Red. The Bears tried to claw their way back, but with a comfortable lead in hand, the Big Red cruised to their first set victory of the day by a score of 25-17.
The second set was simply organized chaos, with bodies and balls flying in every direction. The Bears opened the set with a 3-0 run, but Cornell stormed back and tied the game at 6-all. From there, though, the Big Red started to pull away, claiming a 16-10 advantage over Bruno.
But the Bears didn’t let Cornell simply waltz away with the victory. Star Bruno players Mariia Sidorova ’26 and Sophia Wolfson ’28 — who finished the match with 12 and 11 kills, respectively — sprang into action to help Brown close the deficit. Despite scoring a threatening 22 points, Bruno couldn’t get it done: Ultimately, Cornell took the second set 25-22.
Now facing an outright loss, the Bears put up their biggest fight of the day, blocking and digging Cornell’s strong spikes to try and crawl back. Jessie Golden ’26 and Julia Kakkis ’28 headlined the third set, leading the team with 21 digs and 34 assists on the night, respectively. Locking down the defensive end, the Bears dominated the third set, pulling away 25-16.
“Coaching this group of women is a privilege,” Virtue wrote. “They have an incredible bond, they are very supportive of one another and (they) have great relationships both on and off the court.”
With the chance to draw even, Brown headed into the fourth set with something to prove. The set continued the thrilling back-and-forth play that characterized the first three sets, with the teams trading runs and leads. Although the teams went toe-to-toe in the opening stretches, the Bears managed to pull away 15-13, a mere 10 points from victory. But then, shattering Brown’s hopes, the Big Red delivered a dominant 9-2 run and clinched the set 25-22.
“We played okay against Cornell, (and) it took us a bit of time to settle into that match up (but) we found our rhythm eventually,” Virtue wrote. “That match exposed some very important things that we will need to continue working on.”
Despite the heartbreaking result in Ithaca, the team had no time to dwell on the loss. The next day, they had to face Columbia.
But thankfully for Bruno, the match against the Lions was all Bears from start to finish.
Although the first set was closer than Bruno would have liked — Brown was up just 20-19 toward the end of the set — a series of strikes and blocks put Brown up 24-21. Finally, a block from the Bears sealed Bruno’s first set victory.
Wolfson headlined the start of the second set with two consecutive kills that resulted in a 6-2 Brown scoreline. Brown rode that wave for the rest of the set, aided yet again by 2024 First Team All-Ivy player Sidorova, who killed the set point to put Brown up 2-0. Overall, Sidorova led the way with 13 kills on the day.
Now down by two sets, the Lions roared back in the third, jumping to an early 9-4 lead. But a missed Columbia serve shifted the momentum, and Brown regained ground quickly to draw the score even at 12.
From there, the Bears dominated. Leading by a score of 21-19, Bruno sealed off the last four points with impressive kills by Sidorova, Wolfson and Hannah Flannery ’26 en route to a 25-19 closing set win and a clean 3-0 sweep. Kakkis again led the assist leaderboard with an impressive tally of 27, and the team outblocked Columbia 7-4.
“We played great against Columbia,” Virtue wrote. “I thought Columbia was one of the best serving teams that we have faced, and I was impressed with how our passing unit responded.”
This win marks Brown’s fifth consecutive sweep over Columbia. The Bears now sit at third place in Ivy League standings with nine Ivy matches left to play in the regular season.
“We have the talent, mentality and experience to win a championship,” Virtue said. “That is our goal.”
The team looks to carry this momentum into their first home match-up on Friday at 7 p.m. against Harvard.
