Buffalo, NY – The D'Youville men's volleyball team suffered a loss in their home opener on Wednesday evening to the Penn State-Behrend Lions by the final score of 3-0.

It was a very even first set at the two teams were tied at 12-12 before Behrend took a 19-15. The Spartans came back to trail by two at 21-19 and then 23-21, but the Lions would go on to win the first set 25-21.

After trailing 8-5, D'Youville came back to tie the set at 8-8. The teams remained in a deadlock at 13-13, 17-17, and 20-20. Behrend finally took the lead at 22-20 before the Spartans scored 2 of the next three points to trail 23-22. However the Lions would hold on to score the next two points and win the second set 25-22.

Behrend was out in front in the third 9-5 before the Spartans battled back to tie it at 9-9. The Lions pulled away again at 17-12 but D'Youville came back to took the lead 20-19. Tied at 23, Behrend held a 24-23 lead and was on the brink of winning the match, but the Spartans tied the match and took at 25-24 lead. Despite being within a point of winning the set two times, the Lions tied it up each time and would go on to win the third set 30-28 and the match 3-0.

All eight Spartans contributed to the team in their match against the Lions. Pat Stroh (Hamburg, NY/Hamburg) had a team high 17 kills and eight digs, with Ali Khadra (Williamsville, NY/Williamsville East) addung 10 kills and six blocks. Zac Bochacki (West Seneca, NY/West Seneca West) had seven kills along with Chance MacDowell (Bloomfield, NY/Bloomfield).

Ryan Kilijanski (West Seneca, NY/West Seneca West) recorded 30 assists as Logan Krass (Oswego, NY/Oswego) tallied five kills. James Zeiger (Lancaster, NY/Lancaster) had six digs with Karl Jauch (Lockport, NY/Starpoint) adding two digs.

The next pair of matches for the Spartans will come this Saturday, February 3 as they play St. John Fisher at 12:00pm and Nazareth at 2:00pm. Both matches will be played at St. John Fisher.