DENVER, Colo. – The Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference (RMAC) Volleyball Tournament continued on Friday evening with semifinal competition. In the second match of the night, No. 5 ranked and top-seeded Regis University volleyball team (25-4) fell short and was served a 3-0 upset at the hands of the fourth-seeded Colorado School of Mines Orediggers (22-6).  
 
How It Happened: From the opening set, one could tell that tonight's semifinal matchup was going to be a slugfest as the teams battled to gain an advantage over the other. The visiting Orediggers managed to take a 11-8 lead after the teams exchanged points and were tied at eight points apiece.  Regis just could not find a way to climb back in it in the first set and Mines went on to win 25-21 in set one.
 
Set two could have started better for the Rangers who needed to find a way to swing the momentum in their direction, but not matter what they did, CSM always had an answer. So much so that the Orediggers opened the second set on a 6-0 run before head coach Joel List was forced to call a timeout. The timeout led to a service ace from Mines but before anyone knew it, the score was 11-3 and all of the wind was knocked out of the arena. This was something that RU fans were not accustomed to. Not only losing a set, but finding their team down a set and trailing by eight in the next. Regis got as close as four points, 24-20, but it was too little too late and the next point sealed the second set for the visitors.
 
Down two sets to none, the Rangers were staring their second three-set loss of the season right in the face. With that in mind, the team finally got things going, looking like the RU squad that won 40-consecutive sets in a row. With leads of 5-1 and 8-2, the home side looked to had found their groove. However, CSM started building their momentum back and they clawed all the way back to tie the match at 14. The Orediggers took their first lead of the set at 19-18 and then added another to take a 20-18 advantage late in the match. Regis got it to one-point, 21-20, but Mines scored four of the final five points, handing the Rangers their second 3-0 loss of the season, and snapping their 16-match win streak.  
 
Game Notes: The statistics paint a pretty bleak picture for RU who hit .172, with 20 errors in 116 attempts as a team. The visitors hit .283 and only had 11 errors in 113 attempts. Individually, senior Nikki Kennedy and redshirt-senior Kristen Hornung had 11 kills apiece, with .333 and .409 attack percentages, respectively. Senior setter Silvia Basso tallied a match-best 34 assists and also added 11 digs for a double-double.
 
Up Next for the Rangers: Although the Regis University volleyball team has been knocked out of the RMAC Volleyball Tournament, it is certain that the Rangers will advance to the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division II South Central Regional set to begin in two weeks. Despite the loss, there still remains a high probability that Regis will remain the top-seed in the South-Central Region, but all of that rides on the body of work all of the teams in the region put together before the selection show on Monday, November 25^th at 5:30 PM MST. A link to where you can find the selection show can be found here: NCAA Division II Volleyball Selection Show Link.