April 24, 2007

CHICAGO - The third-seeded Loyola University Chicago men's volleyball team continues its postseason in a MIVA Tournament Semifinal match against second seed IPFW at 4 p.m. on Thursday in Columbus, Ohio. The No. 11 Ramblers are on a six-match win streak while the No. 10 Mastodons enter with a seven-match win streak, including a 3-0 quarterfinal-round sweep of Mercyhurst on Saturday.

The Ramblers trail the all-time series with the Mastodons, 16-10. Loyola has lost to IPFW in the tournament in each of the previous two seasons and are 4-3 all-time in tournament play under fourth-year head coach Shane Davis.

The Ramblers are 6-5 against nationally ranked opponents this season but have won the last three matches with Loyola going 4-1 in Alumni Gym. Four Ramblers were selected to the MIVA All-Conference teams, with seniors James Grunst, Brian Guntli and Zach Bailey named to the first team in voting by the coaches while junior Ian Anderson was voted to the second team.

Guntli runs the Rambler offense with 1,353 assists this season (12.64 apg) and 5,197 in his career to stand 140 assists shy of Davis for the school record.. The Ramblers are 19-1 when hitting above .300 on the attack. Grunst not only leads the nation with a .564 hitting percentage (267-37-408) but also is on pace to shatter Shawn Schroeder's .501 school record set in the 2003 season. Bailey has 256 digs which lands him second on the all-time list, 19 digs behind Krystian Kryzak, who registered 275 digs during the 2005 season. Anderson has 468 kills this season, the sixth-highest single-season total in school history and now needs 10 to pass Mike Alesch's total in 2004 (477) for the fifth-highest total on the all-time list.

First-team All-MIVA performer C.J. Macias leads the MIVA with 4.69 kills and 5.36 points per game and is second on team with a 1.60 digs-per-game average. Macias had 15 kills and hit .545 on the attack (15-3-22) against Mercyhurst in the quarterfinals on Saturday while middle blocker Josh Stewart came up with a match-high six blocks. Stewart leads the MIVA with a 1.52 blocks-per-game average and is second on the team with 2.64 kills per game.

The winner of Thursday's match will meet the winner of fourth seed Ball State versus top seed Ohio State in the MIVA Tournament Championship at 6:30 p.m. on Saturday in St. John Arena. Action from the championship match can be seen live on CSTV.

Loyola swept Ball State in the regular season, winning both meetings 3-1 and the Ramblers split the season series with the Buckeyes, dropping a 3-0 decision on March 23 in Columbus, Ohio before earning a 3-1 win on March 31 in Alumni Gym.