CHICAGO – In the MIVA Tournament quarterfinals, Loyola Chicago (23-3, 13-3 MIVA) powered past No. 8-seeded Queens in straight sets to clinch its spot in the semifinals for the second year in a row on Saturday, April 19 inside Gentile Arena. 

"Tonight was awesome. I thought we did a really good job of taking care of our side of the net with our touches, in system, our service receive. Our passing was good, and our serving was really on tonight with the majority of our misses being long versus in the net, so we still made them make decisions on those misses as well," said head coach Shane Davis.  

How It Happened 
Set One: The opening set saw long rallies and zero tied scores or lead changes with the Ramblers' maintaining its cushion throughout the set. Jake Read started scoring for Loyola on an assist from Ryan McElligott who scored on a dump set moments later. Five Ramblers recorded a kill before their seventh point. Another dump set by McElligott gave Loyola a 9-6 lead then Brad Bell made back-to-back kills to end a long rally and extend the lead to 11-6. After a media timeout, Parker Van Buren served two straight aces to extend the Ramblers' 7-2 scoring run. Read clinched the set with a kill, 25-15, after a long rally that. Loyola hit a .583 clip in the set and three Ramblers had three kills.  

Set Two: Read opened scoring once again, serving an ace that sparked a 4-0 run highlighted by back-to-back blocks from Bell and Daniel Fabikovic. McElligott added his first ace of the night for a 7-3 lead, extended moments later thanks to Fabikovic's kill. A back-and-forth rally was ended after a soft kill from Van Buren, assisted by Nicodemus Meyer for a 12-6 advantage. The Ramblers continued the blocking party with Read and Bell combining for one then Meyer and McElligott adding another. Lukas Anderson recorded his first ace of the match and 12th of the season to put the Ramblers ahead, 17-9. Evan Markworth subbed in to serve then assisted Van Buren's kill to inch Loyola closer to set point. Queens fought off one set point before Bryce Robbins ripped the kill to secure it 25-16. The Ramblers ended the second frame with 10 block assists, two solo blocks and three service aces.  

Set Three: In the final frame, the Royals managed to stay within reach for the first few points before the Ramblers ran away with it, finding themselves up at 12-5 after an ace by Van Buren, his third of the night. The third set was no stranger to long rallies and high balls that kept the crowd turning heads. Van Buren and Meyer jumped for a block to push the Ramblers further ahead, 19-10. A Royals service error put Loyola at match point and Aidan Klein served for the victor. Van Buren had the game-winning kill and advanced the Ramblers to the MIVA semifinals.  

Inside the Box Score 

• Fabikovic led the match with 11 kills on .381 hitting and added three digs, three block assists and one solo block.
• McElligott recorded 33 assists and hit .500 to lead the Ramblers to a .395 hitting percentage. 
• Meyer added six kills and contributed three block assists and Bell had the team high four blocks.  
• Senior Jack Jedick made his first career appearance in the final set while his senior counterpart Evan Markworth made his second of the season in the second frame.  

Up Next  
The Ramblers host the Lewis Flyers on Wednesday, April 23 at 7 p.m. inside Gentile Arena for the tournament semifinals.