RIVER FOREST, Ill. – The Carthage College Red Men saw their Midwest Collegiate Volleyball League Tournament come to an end in the semifinals on Friday night as the Red Men fell to the east division's number-two seed, Mount St. Joseph University in four sets, 3-1.

Currently ranked third in the region, the loss drops the Red Men to 20-3 on the season and possibly on the outside looking in at the 2017 NCAA Division III Men's Volleyball Championship with the loss coupled with a pair of upsets to Vassar and Stevens earlier in the day.
 
"Mount St. Joseph played great tonight," said head coach L.J. Marx following the tough defeat.  "I think they were a little tight in game one and the ball didn't really bounce in either team's directions and we stole a few points and we carried that to a first set win. After that, the game settled down and they really brought a lot of pressure from the service line.  They basically won the battle of 'Volleyball 101', serve and pass.  We weren't able to serve aggressively and consistently enough to get them out of their system.  They did that much better than we did tonight and that ultimately was the answer in match.  From a defensive stand point we out-dug them.  We were scrapping, fighting and hustling but could never quite take control and string the points together."
 
After winning the first set behind a .360 hitting game, the Red Men dropped three-straight sets to fall to the Lions for the first time in program history.
 
As a team the Red Men found themselves on the wrong end of a number of team stats including kills, 50-47, aces, 6-3, and blocks 11-7.
 
Individually, sophomore Matt Reinsel turned in a match-high 41 assists in the loss with Evan Walsh, Braeden Waumans and Marc Hansen leading the Red Men in kills with 14, 12 and 12 respectively.
 
Senior libero, Cody Bolan led the defensive effort for the Red Men with a match-high 14 digs, giving him his 15th double-digit dig game of the season.  Walsh led the Red Men with four blocks followed by Max Bongratz with three.
 
For the Lions, Darrell Swanson tied with Walsh for a match-high with 14 kills and Brett Cooper registered seven blocks.
 
The win moved MSJ to 21-6 on the season and the Lions will face Dominican University in the MCVL Tournament Championship game on Saturday for a chance to earn the conference's first AQ bid.
 
The NCAA DIII Men's Volleyball show will air on Monday, April 17th on NCAA.com.