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Box Score

KENOSHA, Wis. (Apr. 12, 2019) – A valiant effort in the third set was not enough for the North Central College men's volleyball team as the Cardinals saw its season come to an end on Friday night in the Midwest Collegiate Volleyball League (MCVL) Semifinal Match against No. 1 Carthage College (23-1) after struggling to defend the Red Men's unrelenting attack and combat their own errors in the first two sets.

Carthage took command of the first set, 5-1, forcing North Central to use one of its timeouts earlier than anticipated. Jacob Zemba halted the Red Men's momentum coming out of the huddle with a kill off the hands of Michael Trunnzo, but were soon down five and facing an 11-6 deficit. Bozhidar Kolev, Justin Curtis, Nick Lilley and Zemba all came up with kills for the Cardinals, but North Central gave up six service errors and three attack errors, proving the Achilles heel in the 25-14 loss.

The Cardinals tied the first set in the opening points with another kill from Zemba, but Carthage's hard-hitting offense proved troublesome as the Cardinals trailed 11-5. A serving error from Carthage's Evan Walsh gave North Central the serve and set Anthony Kluzazk up for a much-needed service ace to ignite a spark in the Cardinals, but Braeden Waumans fired a kill right back to briefly stop North Central from making a run. The Cardinals continued to fight back but the Red Men's lead was too much and resulted in a second set loss, 25-17.

Both teams opened the third set neck and neck until the Red Men jumped ahead with four straight points to lead 9-5. Kolev and Jason Eslinger added kills which helped bring North Central within one point, but the Red Men toyed with the Cardinals yet again, forcing its opponent to commit three errors and give up a 14-10 lead. North Central called a timeout to regroup and came out of the huddle with back-to-back kills from Kolev and Zemba, cutting the score, 14-12. The Cardinals still had ground to make up but exhibited stellar defense to save multiple lengthy rallies and tie the score 20-20 with a kill from Lilley. Walsh came up with two kills to lead 22-20 and soon were at 24-21. With the crowd clapping and chanting for Carthage's Kai Cromwell at the match-point serve, Kluzak did not let the atmosphere phase him and hit a kill off an assist from Zemba to keep the Cardinals in the match. Unfortunately, the effort was short lived as a kill from Eric Winter gave the Red Men the point it needed for a 25-22 win in the third set and ticket to advance to the MCVL Championship.

Zemba's eight kills gives him a career total of 648 to be the program leader while Kolev's six rank him second in career statistics with 633. Curtis and Eslinger came up big at the net with three blocks a piece while Kluzak added two aces and Trunzo had 25 assists. As a team, the Cardinals were able to gain momentum off of the Red Men's 12 service errors but unfortunately committed ten of their own and were outhit by Carthage's offense, .102 to .341.

The Cardinals end the 2019 campaign with an overall record of 16-11, highlighted by eight weeks among the top-15 teams in the nation and defeating a season-best four ranked opponents in its first 11 matches (University of California, Santa Cruz on Jan. 12, New York University on Jan. 18, Kean University on Jan. 25, and California Lutheran University on Feb. 2). North Central went 9-4 at home, 5-3 on the road and 2-4 at neutral sites and celebrated the program's first four-year senior class.