Sweep and Sour

The men’s volleyball team hung with the Ohio State Buckeyes, ranked 13th in the nation, for much of the evening but was unable to capitalize late in the sets as they fell on Thursday evening at St. John Arena in Columbus, Ohio. The Buckeyes swept Mason in three sets, 30-24, 33-31, 31-29.

Junior outside hitter Eric Lucas led Mason in kills for the second consecutive match to open this season with a total of 16. The loss drops Mason’s record to 1-1 on the season after defeating Lees-McRae at the RAC on Jan. 23. Tied at 18, the Buckeyes scored the next three points after Grayson Overman recorded a solo block.

Mason eventually rallied to cut the lead to 23-21, but a couple of errors gave the Buckeyes a 26-21 lead. The Buckeyes took the set 30-24 and hit a set-high .400 in the first-third of the match. Mason, on the other hand, hit only .057.

Mason led for most of the second set, holding a 22-19 lead in the latter part of the set. After the Buckeyes came back to knot things up at 25, Mason regained the lead 27-25 and eventually had set point at 29-27.

A kill from John Klanac and a Mason error extended the set. The Buckeyes broke away from tie at 30-all to take three of the final four points. Mason trailed 5-1 in the early going of the third set, but after falling behind 20-17, Mason went on a 4-0 run to take a lead. At 23-all, Lucas recorded two kills and freshman middle blocker Piotr Dabrowski smashed an ace to give the team a 26-23 lead.

However, the Buckeyes did not back down, taking the next two points to cut the Mason lead to one.Both teams traded points back and forth until the Buckeyes finally pulled away.

Klanac and Shawn Sangrey both notched double-digit kills for Ohio State and Mike Berzins led all players with 10 digs. Mason will return to the RAC for a home matchup against Springfield College at 7 p.m. on Feb. 5.