The race for the inaugural Northern Athletics Collegiate Conference (NACC) men's volleyball championship is heating up and the Dominican University Stars kept pace atop the league standings with a three-set (25-14, 25-19, 25-14) sweep of the Concordia University Wisconsin Falcons on the road on Wednesday night. With the win, the Stars improve to 7-1 in conference play and 19-6 overall.

"It's always a good feeling to get a conference win on the road," commented Dan Pawlikowski, the Stars' first-year head coach. "Again we had some nice individual contributions and overall good team play."

The Stars hit .247 to the Falcons' .025 attack percentage and collected nine aces at the serving line without allowing an ace.

Junior Nidhin Thomas scored a team-high 12.0 points for the Stars with seven kills and five aces. Freshman Troy Kates knocked down a match-high ten kills while sophomore Patrick Bradford added nine. For Kates, the double-digit kill effort came on just 15 swings as the rookie hit .600 in the winning effort.

Defensively, Dominican forced the Falcons into 19 errors while allowing just 21 kills on 80 total attacks. Freshman libero Bregin DeMarco led the back row effort with a team-high seven digs.

Dominican will now prepare for a showdown with the MSOE Raiders at the Igini Sports Forum on Friday night before the #5 Benedictine University Eagles visit the Stars in River Forest on Wednesday, April 4. Both matches are scheduled for 7:00 p.m. starts.