IRVINE, Calif. – In their third match in four days, No. 14 Concordia (9-10, 3-3 MPSF) headed back to the floor of CU Arena to take on Fort Wayne (15-5, 3-3 MIVA) in a non-conference match. Both teams were coming off upsets of top ten teams with the Eagles defeating No. 6 Loyola-Chicago and the Mastadons winning at No. 3 UC Irvine. But on Saturday night, Fort Wayne came to play as they outhit Concordia, .337-.144, in a 3-0 (25-15, 25-22, 25-23) victory over the Eagles.
 
The wealth was spread around for the Eagles, where four players had five or more kills, led by Raymond Barsemian with eight. Darcy Taig had the next most kills with seven and hit .333 while Hunter Howell went errorless for the seventh-time this season with six kills and hit .500.
 
Fort Wayne utilized their game plan effectively and early, jumping out to an 8-1 lead in the first set. A Jonathan Predney kill got Concordia their third point of the set, but tough serving from the Mastadons put them up by ten at 13-3. The Eagles tried to crawl back into the set at 14-17 behind a kill from Barsemian, who then sent back a Fort Wayne attack with Howell to go on a 3-0 run. A Fort Wayne service error and block by Jonathan Carlson and Taylor Falduti sparked the Eagles, however, the Mastadons returned with two of their own to make the score 19-11. A 5-1 run gave Fort Wayne set point at 24-13 until Howell crushed a kill from the middle and an attack error by the Mastadons kept the Eagles alive. A joust at the net went in favor of Fort Wayne to give them a 1-0 lead over Concordia.
 
Set two became competitive between the two teams as teams traded side-outs to begin the first half of the set. Concordia earned consecutive points to lead 9-8 from a Barsemian kill in a one-on-one situation set up by Chandler Gibb and a solo block also by Barsemian. Yet again, Barsemian collected a kill to tie the set at 12-12 and the Eagles regained the lead from a smart kill out-of-system from Howell who wiped a tight set off the Mastadon's block. Down by three, Taig tooled the block for one of his four kills in the set and Barsemian served an ace to bring the score to 20-19 Fort Wayne. A solo block by Falduti and another kill by Taig kept the Eagles in the set, but the Mastadons benefited from two Eagles' errors to take the set.
 
The Mastadons got ahead early at 6-4 and the Eagles responded with two points to tie the set. Fort Wayne went on a 6-2 run to force Concordia into a timeout, leading 9-6. Teams traded points with Fort Wayne consistently holding the lead at 20-16. Isaiah Kaaa checked in with Predney and gave the Eagles some energy as Kaaa got the back-row attacks going with two kills from Predney and one from Barsemian to close the gap to one. Fort Wayne took advantage of a Concordia service error to get ahead 24-22, but Kaaa set up Howell who put down his hardest hit of the night to fight off one match point. Within one, a self-inflicted error from Concordia ended the match and gave Fort Wayne another upset for the week.
 
Next Up: Concordia will play one more non-conference match against Harvard on March 12^th at 7 PM in CU Arena before returning to conference play.