The Dominican University men's volleyball team, competing in their first NCAA Division III National Tournament, could not slow down the Stevens Institute of Technology Ducks in a 3-1 (25-21, 25-17, 26-28, 25-23) loss to end the Stars' season in the national quarterfinals.
 
"It was heck of a match," commented Dan Ames, the Stars' fourth-year head coach and AVCA National Coach of the Year.  "The second set wasn't pretty but it was exactly what we thought from the moment we knew we were playing Stevens we knew it was going to be a battle and they played great today. Our defense has led to offense all year but today we let them hit .410 and that is really hard to overcome."
 
The Stars came out hot, rattling off back-to-back points midway through the set and force the first timeout of the match leading 15-12.  The Ducks scored four of the next five points out of the timeout to even the set at 16-16.  After a Stars' sideout, Stevens put up another three-point spurt to pull in front 19-17.
 
Dominican battled back and evened the score at 20-20 on a kill by freshman Ethan Klosak before Stevens scored five of the next six points to take a 1-0 lead.
 
The Ducks outhit the Stars, .474 to .231, despite four kills apiece for Klosak and Luke Spicer.
 
In the second set, Stevens led from wire-to-wire, posting a 72-percent sideout percentage, aided largely by six Dominican University service errors.
 
With their backs against the wall, the Stars rose the challenge in the third set, extending the match to a fourth stanza, hitting .484 in the third.  Senior Michal Kawa heated up, knocking down eight of his team-high 19 kills in the third frame.  No kill was bigger than Kawa's final kill of the set which broke the 21^st tie of the set and set up set point for the Stars at 27-26.  A Ducks' attack error then gave the Stars their first set victory in the national tournament in program history.
 
Stevens tried to slow any momentum the Stars gained from the third set, quickly scoring five of the first seven points of the fourth set to open a 5-2 lead.  Dominican scratched and clawed throughout the set, at one point rattling off five straight points to pull ahead 16-15.  The Ducks answered with their own three-point swing, pulling back in front 18-16.  Later in the set, back-to-back kills by Spicer put the Stars back in front, 21-20, before four straight points for Stevens set up match point.  The Stars were able to stave off match point twice, including another kill by Klosak, the 12^th of the match for the rookie, before Stevens' David Lehman punched the Ducks' ticket into the final four with his team-high 19^th kill of the afternoon.
 
Dominican hit .331 in the losing effort but committed 19 service errors in the match.  The Ducks hit at a .410 clip and went 64-for-91 on sideout attempts.
 
 
Dominican's first-team All-American setter Alex Coyne dished out 55 assists in the losing effort, using seven different attackers including Kawa, Spicer and Klosak, all of whom reached double-digit kills.  Kawa finished with a season-high 19 kills on 38 swings while Spicer knocked down 18 kills on 36 attempts and Klosak added 12 kills.
 
For the Ducks, Lehman shared game-high honors with 19 kills, including five kills in the clinching fourth set.  Gabe Shankweiler added 13 kills while Dylan DeBoer finished with nine kills on 21 attacks.
 
At the net, the Ducks posted 13 blocks, including eight total blocks for Jordan Stuart, while Dominican, one of the best blocking teams in the country, managed just four blocks in the loss.