KENOSHA, Wis. – The #4 Carthage College men's volleyball team dropped their first Midwest Collegiate Volleyball League game of the season on Friday night at Tarble Arena, as the #12 Dominican University Stars topped the Red Men in four sets, 3-1.
 
The first ever regular season loss for the Red Men in the MCVL drops Carthage to 20-2 in 2017 and to 17-1 in the league, while the Stars improve to 23-2 and 17-1 in the MCVL.
 
"It was clear tonight that Dominican played better than us over the course of the match," said head coach L.J. Marx following the loss.  "We had moments where we played very, very well and we had moments that we were sub-par.  That was the difference tonight.  We were in control of the second set until the very end and then Dominican made a couple great plays to extend it into extra points.  That is when it started that we were playing to not lose and not make mistakes as opposed to going after them and scoring points.  In the third set, we played very well and they started struggling a little bit.  The fourth set was probably the best set played from an offensive standpoint.  The difference was their offense was just better than ours.  We couldn't slow it down and a lot of that was losing the serve pass game.  They were clearly more aggressive and kept their serves in.  It's one of those things that will not show up in the stats that make a little difference and it was a dictator in the match."
 
As a team the Red Men were outhit .300 to .276 only outhitting Dominican as a team in the third set, .294 to .282.
 
Matt Reinsel led the Red Men with a match-high 58 assists in the loss, with Marc Hansen being on the receiving end of a team-high 21 for Carthage.  Middle blocker Zach Lillig's career high 17 kills followed Hansen's 21 kills for the Red Men.
 
Lillig was also a force at the net for the Red Men as he registered five blocks, while Reinsel added his second-most digs in the season with 17.
 
The Red Men will look to rebound from the loss on Saturday as the Red Men take on Benedictine University at Tarble Arena at 3:00 p.m.
 
Prior to Saturday's matinee Carthage will recognize a trio of seniors during Senior Day festivities as Cody Bolan, Marc Hansen and Griffin Shields are honored.