AMHERST — The travel schedule for women’s volleyball teams in the New England Small College Athletic Conference is never easy.
Amherst College will experience this firsthand this weekend with a pair of road games against Middlebury and Hamilton.
Amherst will have traveled 534 miles when it faces Middlebury Friday night at 7 p.m.
It will leave Middlebury, Vermont, directly after the game and drive 175 miles to Clinton, New York, for a 2 p.m. showdown with Hamilton (6-6, 2-4 NESCAC) on Saturday.
“I’m kind of happy we are playing Middlebury first and Hamilton second,” Amherst coach Sue Everden said prior to Wednesday’s practice. “It’s one of those things where we have to go to their place, both of them, so hopefully we’ll be able to put it together back-to-back.”
Last year, Amherst made the Middlebury-Hamilton trip midseason. It dropped the first match against the Panthers, and beat the Colonials the following day.
Amherst (10-5, 4-2 NESCAC) enters the weekend tied for second with Middlebury (12-4, 4-2 NESCAC) and Williams. It owns the tie-breaker over the Ephs after defeating them on Sept. 23.
“I feel like this is a big weekend that we need to split,” Everden said. “Taking two would be really nice in terms of where it puts us in the conference.”
The Panthers have won eight of their last nine entering Friday’s matchup.
Amherst will need to stop Middlebury’s dynamic duo of outside hitters in junior Becca Raffel (167 kills) and sophomore Isabel Sessions (164).
Everden said the weekend road trips are beneficial because it allows the team to take a step back, focus on volleyball and spend time together as a unit.
“Most of the kids treat it like that too,” she said. “Middlebury will be fun; they’ll do some things (as a team).”
Everden added: “It’s nice, they get away from here. I’ve had great seasons where we’ve spent a lot of time away, and I think this is a good team.”
Andrew Cyr is a UMass student and can be reached at andrewrcyr@gmail.com.