MILWAUKEE, Wis. - The Rockford University men's volleyball team fell 3-0 on the road Friday night to the MSOE Raiders. Rockford once again played one of the top teams in the NACC tough, but was unable to come up enough points down the stretch to pull out the win. The Regents were within striking distance in the closing moments of all three sets, but each time it was the Raiders who closed strong, and thus captured a tight 25-22, 25-20, 25-19 win.
- Rockford open the match on a 9-5 run to take its largest lead of the day. A trio of Regents smashed home a kill and Joaquin Santillan served up an ace over that span.
- The Raiders responded with a 7-1 spurt of their own and took their first lead of the day at 12-10.
- With MSOE now leading 19-14, Rockford scored seven of the next nine points to tie the set at 21-21. Four different Regents had a kill during the run, capped off by Connor McNear's second kill of the set.
- Unfortunately, the Raiders closed on a 4-1 run to win the set and take a 1-0 advantage.
- The second set was again up for grabs, until MSOE seized control late.
- The Raiders jumped out to a 5-1 lead, but Rockford answered with an 8-3 run to take a 9-8 advantage. Rockford got kills from four different players to start the set, capped off by one from Danny Karpenko.
- With Rockford now trailing 19-18, MSOE scored six of the next eight points to win the second set 25-20 and take a 2-0 lead.
- Although the Regents only briefly led to begin the third set (1-0), Rockford remained within striking distance for much of the way.
- However, with MSOE still clinging to a 13-11 advantage, the Raiders used a 5-1 run to take their largest lead of the match.
- Rockford did get back to within four on several occasions, with the last such time coming at 23-19.
- Unfortunately, MSOE scored the final two points to win the set 25-19 and the match 3-0.
