NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J. – Rutgers volleyball captured its fifth sweep of the season in a happy homecoming. The Scarlet Knights defeated Marist, 25-23, 25-19, 25-16 in its home opener on Wednesday night at the College Ave Gym.

Rutgers picked up its fifth-straight win to improve to 8-1 on the year. Marist, meanwhile, dropped to 2-9 overall.

• Redshirt sophomore Alissa Kinkela continued her hot hitting swinging at a .525 clip with 10 kills on 19 attempts with no errors. The Melbourne, Australia native also added five digs and three blocks.
• Sophomore Taylor Humphrey was just shy of double-figure kills with nine.
• Fifth-year senior Alyssa Nayar provided 28 assists.
• Rutgers totaled 15 blocks on the night led by four stops from Rikki Williams. Williams also added eight kills.
• Senior Kristina Grkovic collected a trio of rejections and led RU at the service line with a pair of aces.
• Senior Madyson Chitty posted seven digs and is now five away from reaching the 1,000 career dig milestone.

• Set 1 (25-23) | The Red Foxes had the lead early but the strong swing on the over ball by Taylor Humphrey knotted the score at 16-16. From there, the set was tied seven times before Rutgers outscored Marist 4-1 for the win. Alissa Kinkela led with six kills on 12 swings with no errors.  

• Set 2 (25-19) | Rutgers went out to a 5-1 lead and never looked back. Kinkela continued her hot hitting with another three kills on five attempts for a .529 hitting percentage heading into the break. Marist tied the frame up at 14-14, but an 8-2 run following kept RU in solid control.  

• Set 3 (25-16) | It was another 5-1 advantage for the Scarlet Knights to start the final frame. The Red Foxes pulled within a pair of points with RU leading 12-10, but Marist would not score back-to-back points the rest of the night. Rutgers hit a match-best .400 in the set with Rikki Williams, Taylor Humphrey and Alissa Kinkela each contributing a trio of kills. The Red Foxes, meanwhile, were in the negative with 11 errors as compared to eight kills.

• Rutgers has collected five sweeps for the third-straight season. The Scarlet Knights collected its fifth sweep in 2022 against Iowa on November 4 and had five non-conference sweeps in 2021.
• With her pair of aces, Kristina Grkovic moved into the rally-era top 10 in career aces with 57. She needs two more to move into ninth past Alex Lass (2012-15) and seven more to move ahead of Caitlin Sexton (2008-10) for eighth.

• The Rutgers volleyball team is back in action on Friday, Sept. 15 versus Princeton. Match time is set for 7 p.m. at the College Ave Gym. Admission is free.