The Dominican University men's volleyball team suffered their third straight setback, falling to the fourth-ranked Carthage College Red Men in three sets (25-23, 25-17, 25-15) on Wednesday night at the Tarble Arena in Kenosha, Wisconsin.  The loss drops the Stars to 9-4 on the season with a trip to California on deck for Dominican.
 
"We have picked a really bad time of the season to play some of our worst ball," commented Dan Pawlikowski, the Stars' head coach in his second season. "We understood the caliber of opponent and the atmosphere but didn't respond well after the first set loss. We had a great opportunity to go up 1-0 but didn't capitalize and Carthage's offense carried them to the win. After a long winning streak to start the year, we have squarely put ourselves in this losing streak. The schedule doesn't get any easier from here on out so we must raise our level of play and aggression if we want this season to go well."
 
The Stars hit a season-low .111 in the loss, managing just 29 kills to 19 errors on 90 total attacks.  After hitting .444 in the opening set, the Stars committed 18 errors over the final two frames.  Across the net, the host Red Men hit .323 in the win, knocking down a total of 46 kills to pick up the win.  The Red Men offense was hot in the opening set, collecting 21 kills in the first set alone.
 
Ethan Klosak and Adam Eboli paced the Dominican attack with seven kills apiece while Evan Walsh knocked down a match-high 13 kills for Carthage.
 
Dominican will take on the Academy United of the National Volleyball Association on Sunday in an exhibition match in Livermore, California. The Stars then head to UC-Santa Cruz on Monday, meeting the University of California-Merced Bobcats and UC-Santa Cruz Banana Slugs.  The west coast swing then comes to a close on Wednesday with a match against the Concordia University Irvine Eagles.