Aurora, Ill.- Concordia-Chicago volleyball concluded their great season at the Jim Coleman Memorial at Aurora University this afternoon with matches against University of Chicago and University of Dubuque.  Hoping to bounce back off a tough day yesterday evening, the Cougars looked to end the season with momentum heading into next year.  Much to the dismay of CUC, they closed out the year getting swept losing to the Maroons of Chicago and Spartans of Dubuque.

In the first match against the 19th ranked Maroons, Chicago applied pressure on the Cougars defense attacking from everywhere on the court.  The Maroons dominated all three sets in their win holding the Cougars attack to a .010 percentage on the afternoon. Shannon Stamp led Concordia-Chicago with seven kills.  

The second match against Dubuque got off to a better start for the Cougars.  Both teams were even with each other much of the first set until Concordia-Chicago rattled off four straight points to take the lead at 16-12 led by a Nicoletta Crowley ace.  The Cougars held on late capitalizing on four straight Spartans errors to win the set 25-21.  

The next three sets were not kind to the Cougars as the Spartans took over the match benefitting from double digit service and return errors from CUC.  In set two, Dubuque jumped out to a 14-5 and didn't look back from there to go on to win 25-16.

Set three was the set of runs.  The Spartans started off scoring four straight points, but the Cougars rallied back with eight straight of their own highlighted by three Elise Sombke service aces and kills by Julia Spitelli, Jennifer Livesay, Jaylynn Johnson, and Alexa Lomantini.  After a little back and forth play, Dubuque used their second run to tie up the set at 20-20.  The Spartans were able to hold on and complete their comeback in set three to a 26-24 win.

The fourth set had it even midway through at 13-12 in favor of Dubuque.  However, that's when the Spartans put their foot on gas pedal and shot down any chance of the Cougars coming back.  Scoring eight of the next ten points, Dubuque closed out the match winning 25-15 and the match 3-1.

Livesay led the Cougars with 12 kills, followed by Stamp and Johnson each with 9 kills.  Sombke led with 4 service aces and 15 digs.         

The Cougars finished 18-15 overall on the year, which was their best record since the 2008-2009 season.