Columbia Invitational MVP Atlanta Moye-McLaren goes for the kill

Class of 2016, cherish this moment. Your Columbia Lions football team is undefeated. The team opened the 2012 season with a narrow 10-9 victory over Marist, erasing fears that the Lions would have another 9-game winless streak to start the season and undoubtedly taking some pressure off new football head coach Pete Mangurian. The football squad wasn’t the only winner this weekend. Volleyball swept the Columbia Invitational with three straight wins and freshman Atlanta Moye-McLaren was named MVP of the tournament. To boot, Field Hockey extended their win streak to four and both Men’s and Women’s soccer teams added wins to their records.

Read on for more Columbia Athletics news and results from the week.

Volleyball (5-4):

Results:

Columbia Invitational
Colgate 3-1 (W)
Rhode Island 3-0 (W)
Hofstra 3-2 (W)

Overview: Volleyball opened their home season this weekend as they hosted Colgate, Rhode Island, and Hofstra in Levien for the Columbia Invitational. The Lion’s faced Colgate in their first match of the weekend on Friday, where strong blocking made the difference in the four-set contest. After winning the first two sets 25-18, 25-20, Columbia dropped the third set despite an emphatic kill from junior Savannah Fletcher to tie the score at 24-24. The Raiders took the next two points and the set 26-24, before falling to the Lions 25-19 in the fourth. Columbia outblocked Colgate 28 to 5 in the win.

The Lions carried the momentum from Friday’s win into Saturday as they swept Rhode Island in three straight sets. After mounting a commanding two set lead, Columbia struggled to finish off the Rams in the third, narrowly scraping by with a 28-26 win. Later in the day, the Lions faced Hofstra for a back-and-forth five-set battle to close out the tournament. The Hofstra Pride came out strong in the first set, recording 19 kills to Columbia’s seven and winning the opening set 25-19. The Pride continued to put pressure on the Lions in the second set, but Columbia broke ahead late in the set to a 24-20 lead before closing it out, 25-21. The third set went to the Lions, but the Pride came charging back in the fourth, opening with four unanswered points at taking the set 25-19. The fifth set was as competitive and nail-bitingly close as the rest of the game, but Columbia pulled ahead with three consecutive points to jump to a 10-7 lead before finishing the Pride off, 15-12.

Freshman Atlanta Moye-McLaren was named MVP of the tournament, who posted double-doubles against Rhode Island and Hofstra with 10 kills and 13 digs in each. Moye-McLaren was joined by Fletcher and senior Megan Gaughn on the All-Tournament team.

Up Next: The Lions open their Ivy League season next Saturday (9/22) against Cornell at 2 pm in Levien Gymnasium

Read more about the Lions after the jump.