GOSHEN, Ind. — The Goshen College men's volleyball team locked up its first-ever postseason berth Tuesday night and Alexander Rabadzhiev extended the program record past 1,000 kills in a five-set win over Mount Vernon Nazarene University in Ruth Gunden Gymnasium.
While the Cougars came back to erase one-set Goshen leads on two occasions, Goshen won 25-23, 20-25, 25-22, 20-25, 15-10.
Rabadzhiev finished with 28 kills, a season high and one off his program record and 9 digs to lead the team. Michael Wahl added 46 assists. Ian Fox led all players with 8 blocks as the Maple Leafs (14-8, 6-5) stuffed Mount Vernon Nazarene at the net 14 times.
The Cougars (8-9, 4-7) finished with more kills than the Maple Leafs, 67-59, but also finished with more hitting errors. Goshen hit errorlessly in the fifth set, posting nine kills in 15 attempts while forcing MVNU into five errors of their own.
MVNU got a match-high 29 winners from Spencer Stanley to go with 17 from Caden Donaldson and 13 from Landon Ewers. Stanley also led the team with 4 blocks and Jaysen Matsumoto added 56 assists, 14 digs and 2 aces. Daniel Skrzypchak and Caden Donaldson each hit double figures in the digs column as well.
Goshen led throughout the early first set, going up 9-5 on a Fox block and a Rabadzhiev kill and using another 3-point run capped by a Nick Yutzy ace to take a 16-14 lead. MVNU came back to take the lead twice, though, using a Matsumoto ace to take a 22-20 lead. The Leafs laughed last, though, winning five of the last six points on two kills and three blocks to take the set.
The Cougars carried their late momentum into the second set, going up 6-3 and then breaking the set open with a 5-0 run on Donaldson's serve. Another 5-0 run on Matsumoto's serve got the lead to 10 points before Goshen answered with 8 of the next 9 rallies, but it would be too little, too late as the match was soon tied.
The third set stayed within two points of even, going one way or the other, until back-to-back Cougar errors gave Goshen a 21-17 lead. The teams traded points until GC's set point at 24-21, when MVNU got an attack error for a sideout but Bennett's winner ended the set.
Mount Vernon Nazarene got another run to pull ahead in the fourth set, using a 6-2 spurt to flip a 10-9 deficit into a 15-12 lead before running off five straight points to go up 21-14. Again, Goshen got the margin back to 3 points but could come no closer.
Goshen started the fifth set with a 6-2 run that included three kills and a block from Rabadzhiev. Another 6-1 spurt came close to slamming the door and Rabadzhiev added the last two kills to make it 14-8 and 15-10.
The junior from Razlog, Bulgaria, now has 1,002 career winners to go with 88 aces and 131 blocks.
The Maple Leafs wrap up the regular season on Saturday when they travel to Cornerstone University in Grand Rapids, Michigan. First serve is set for 1 p.m. at Mol Arena in each team's final WHAC match of the season. Goshen needs a win and some help from Indiana Tech and Mount Vernon Nazarene to lock in the third seed in the conference tournament.
