Appearing in its fourth consecutive America East Volleyball Championship, the No. 4-seeded Binghamton volleyball team fell 3-2 to hosts No. 1 UMBC in the AE semifinals on Friday evening. After dropping the first set, the Bearcats claimed victories in sets two and three, before surrendering the final two sets of the match as their 2025 campaign came to an end.

“I thought we were the better team on Friday, a couple things didn’t go our way, unfortunately, but I thought we fought a good fight and overall played well as a unit,” wrote Binghamton head coach Allie Yaeger.

Binghamton (12-14, 6-4 AE) opened the first set with an early 3-1 lead following a pair of kills from sophomore right side hitter Viktoria Dimitrova, but the Retrievers (13-11, 7-3 AE) recovered with a 4-1 run to take command of the lead. Despite staying within an arm’s length of UMBC, the Bearcats trailed throughout the remainder of the first set, as the Retrievers totaled 16 kills alongside a .400 hitting percentage en route to their 25-17 set one victory.

The foes opened the second set neck-and-neck, trading points before deadlocking at 5-5. Binghamton’s offense exploded from there, scoring nine straight points as sophomore setter Regan Kadel served, giving the Bearcats a 14-5 advantage. Although UMBC battled back, a block by freshman right side hitter Maya Coblentz-Brown brought Binghamton within a point of victory in the second set. Soon after, Coblentz-Brown secured the 25-16 Bearcat win with a kill.

“We blocked well, we did a good job of getting UMBC out of system so our blockers knew where the ball was going,” Yaeger wrote.

After scoring the first point of the third set, Binghamton’s momentum cooled, jumping to an early 6-4 deficit. The Bearcats stayed within striking distance of the Retrievers, tying it up at 7-7 with a kill from freshman middle blocker Hannah Olmstead, before Coblentz-Brown capped off a 4-0 run with a kill to put the Bearcats ahead 11-8. Later in the frame, UMBC fought back to even the score at 22-22, but Binghamton closed out the set with another 3-0 run, with the final score of the set coming off a block by Coblentz-Brown.

Heading into a potential victory-clinching fourth set, the Bearcats and Retrievers traded leads before arriving at an early deadlock. Binghamton began to pull ahead, as a kill from Dimitrova saw the Bearcats regain the lead at 9-6. Before long, the opponents traded leads once more and a kill from freshman middle blocker Francesca Pierdonati saw Binghamton with an 18-14 advantage. However, the Retrievers compiled a 10-1 run, giving them a 24-19 lead, and a late 3-0 spurt from the Bearcats proved insufficient to win the set as they fell 25-22.

“We had all the momentum in the fourth set until we didn’t,” Yaeger wrote. “It was hard for us to recover from that. UMBC found it and ran with it.”

In the game-deciding fifth and final set, play continued to remain well-matched. Neither squad held a lead of more than one until Binghamton followed a UMBC attack error with a service ace courtesy of Kadel. Immediately after, the floodgates opened for the Retrievers, as they tied the set at 10-10 before closing the match on a 5-0 run, claiming a 3-2 victory.

“We are very excited [about] the future of Bearcat volleyball,” Yaeger wrote. “We have a great group of players that are very dedicated to this program and eager to get back at it. Our seniors did a great job this year guiding this team and helping create a winning culture. We will miss them so much.”

Despite their season coming to a close, several Bearcats earned AE all-conference honors with senior libero Emily Cronkhite earning the squad’s lone all-tournament team selection. Dimitrova and senior outside hitter Merima Smajlovic were both named to the AE first-team all-conference, while Pierdonati and Coblentz-Brown earned AE all-rookie team honors.