Mount men's volleyball team evens conference mark at .500 with 3-0 home win over Fontbonne University

The College of Mount St. Joseph men's volleyball team used a varied hitting attack, and took advantage of Fontbonne hitting and service errors, to record a 3-0 win on Friday night in the Harrington Center. The win moves the Lions' season mark to 12-8 overall, 3-3 in the CVC, while Fontbonne slips to 6-9, 0-5. The Mount resumes action on Mar. 22 when they take on Fontbonne again, in a non-conference match, and host Rust College.

Set one saw the Lions jump out to leads of 10-6, and 20-16, thanks to the hitting of teammates Alex Vohland (West Chester, OH/Lakota West), Cesar Trigo de Serrano (Miami, FL/Christopher Columbus) and Toby Birnbrich (Anthem, AZ/Boulder Creek), among others. Lyle Lehmann (Rapid City, SD/Rapid City Central) ended the first set at 25-20 when he registered an ace. The two teams hit at equal rate in the second set, and after early ties, the Lions trailed by a 16-15 score. The Mount then reeled off four straight points, behind the hitting of Alec King (Cincinnati, OH/La Salle) and Vohland, to take a 19-16 lead. Fontbonne's error ended the second set, 26-24. The Lions then completed the 3-0 win with a 26-24 score in the third set. They jumped out to a 7-1 lead in the final set, but the Griffins fought back to produce ties at points 18 through 21. Fontbonne held a 23-21 in the final set, before's King's hitting rallied his team to a two-point win.

Vohland led the way offensively with a match-high 17 kills, and added 11 digs and three block assists. de Serrano and Birnbrich added eight kills each, with the two of them combining for eight block assists. Luke Eschenbach (Cincinnati, OH/La Salle) had 37 assists and nine digs while Zach Keubler (Columbus, OH/Hilliard Darby) added a match-high 18 digs.

The Mount had 43 kills and a .223 hitting efficiency, while Fontbonne had 33 kills and a .080 hitting percentage.

Mount Head Coach Ryan Lengerich had these comments about his team's win.

“The guys had to play hard and play well to win against a Fontbonne team that really defends the court well,'' Lengerich said. "That team brings it against us and tonight was no different. I give my guys a lot of credit of winning in three games because Fontbonne is a good team, that you don’t want to give confidence to. That was an important conference win.”