#1 Tampa Advances to the Final Four

Pensacola, Fla. - The University of Tampa (33-1) moved on to the Final Four of the Division II National Volleyball Tournament with a 3-0 victory over the Northeast Region champ #25 Dowling College (36-7).

After hearing the bad news that the Tampa women's soccer team lost in their national semi-final game against Grand Valley State , the volleyball team became even more determined to advance to the Final Four.

Tampa jumped out to an early lead in game one, behind Alisha Green and many Dowling errors, forcing the Golden Lions to take a timeout. Things didn't improve for Dowling afterward as Green built her hot start, she finished the game with a team-high five kills, as Tampa took the win 30-23.

Dowling came out a little stronger in the second game, but in the end the result was the same as Tampa took a 2-0 lead with a 30-27 score. Danielle MacDonald led Tampa with five kills, and Katelen Dixon was right behind her with four.

Game three saw Tampa once again jump to an early lead only to let Dowling make their own mid-game run to close the Tampa lead to 15-14. Green jumped at her chance to take the game over as she thwarted many Golden Lion attacks, helping the Spartans regain momentum and the lead at 20-15. Tampa never looked back after that, closing the game and the match with a final score of 30-27.

MacDonald led the Spartans with 13 kills, Dixon finished with 11 while Tarah Marinelli had 10. Tampa only had three blocks and Green had a hand in all of them. Gabriella Saade had a good match, recording 46 assists, and Margeaux Sinibaldi moves to within two digs of her own single season record of 557, as she picked up 15 on the day.

Tampa moves on to face #2 Minnesota-Duluth who defeated UC-San Diego 3-1 in earlier action. Game time is slated for 4:00 pm CT.