AURORA, Ill. - The Rockford University men's volleyball team fell 3-0 on the road Saturday afternoon to the Aurora University Spartans. Aurora jumped out to big leads in both the first (11-3) and third (8-1) sets, but Rockford was able to grab a quick 8-2 lead in the second. The Regents did hang with the Spartans for a good portion of the afternoon, but ultimately, Aurora was just too much for Rockford to handle. The Spartans went on to win by final scores of 25-16, 25-18, 25-15.
- The Spartans opened the match on a 11-3 run to snag a quick eight-point lead.
- Rockford was however able to trim the deficit down to 12-6 following an Isaiah Dixon kill.
- Unfortunately, Aurora scored six of the next seven points en route to capturing the opening set 25-16.
- The second set got off to the opposite start with Rockford jumping out to an 8-2 lead. Joaquin Santillan and Nathan Vana led the Regent attack with 2 kills and 1 kill over that span.
- However, the Spartans answered right back with an 8-1 run of their own to grab their first lead of the set at 10-9.
- The two schools went back and forth trading points until the set was tied at 13-13.
- Aurora then scored the next six points to take its largest lead thus far in the second set.
- Rockford was unable to get any closer than five the rest of the way, dropping the set 25-18.
- The Spartans picked up right where they left off by leaping out to a 7-2 advantage to begin the third.
- With the Regents still trailing by five at 13-8, Aurora ran off the next four points to take the largest in the set thus far for either team.
- Unfortunately, Rockford could not get closer than eight for the remainder of the day, falling 25-15 in the third and dropping the match 3-0.
- Nathan Vana led Rockford with 5 kills on just 9 attempts for a .444 hitting percentage.
- Danny Karpenko tallied 3 kills, both Rockford's aces and a team-high 5 blocks. Karpenko's five blocks were just one off the school's single-match record and his 1.66 blocks per set tied the RU single-match record.
- Joseph Hinckley added 4 kills and a dig.
- Tsubasa Namai finished with a team-high 18 assists, 1 kill, 1 block and 1 dig.
