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PARKVILLE, Mo. — The No. 4 Park University men’s volleyball team had a rough go of things on Friday night as No. 1 Benedictine University – Mesa (Ariz.) defeated the Pirates in the semifinals of the NAIA Men’s Volleyball National Championship, 3-0 (25-15, 25-17, 25-23), at the MidAmerican Energy Company RecPlex in West Des Moines, Iowa. It was the Pirates third straight loss in the national semifinals and second consecutive loss to BenUMesa in the national semis.

Parks ends its season at 27-2, with its only other loss to Heart of America Athletic Conference rival Missouri Baptist University on March 18. BenUMesa is now 27-3 and will play in the national championship tomorrow night against Vanguard University (Calif., 19-5).

The Pirates were seeking the sixth men’s volleyball national title in Park’s history (2003, 2008, 2012, 2014 and 2017). Park was the only school from Missouri or Kansas to advance to the national tournament, not to mention the only school among the top six seeds from outside of California or Arizona.

Park’s Mike Talamantes, in his 12th season as director of volleyball and men’s/women’s volleyball head coach, has a 269-67 (80.0%) record leading the Pirates’ men’s squad. In addition, Talamantes has 399-71 (84.9%) record as Park’s women’s head coach. His overall record at Park is 668-138 (82.9%). Under his helm, Park’s men have won three national titles (2012, 2014 and 2017), while the women’s team has won two (2014 and 2018).

Against Benedictine-Mesa tonight in the first set, the RedHawks scored the first three points and were never really threatened. BenUMesa hit .550 in the set with just one attack error, while holding the Pirates to just .050 hitting

The second set wasn’t any better for Park, hitting -.029 as the Pirates had more attack errors than kills. Again, the RedHawks jumped out to a 3-0 lead. Park closed the gap to two at 5-3, but that was the closest the Pirates could get the rest of the way.

Set three was a different story. Park scored the first point of the set, but BenUMesa rolled off three straight points for a 4-1 lead. The Pirates kept fighting and tied the set at 9-9 before the RedHawks scored 8 of the next 13 points for a 17-14 lead. However, Park came back to tie the set at 17. The set was tied five more times, the last at 23-23, before BenUMesa closed out the match scoring the last two points.

For the match, BenUMesa hit .329 while holding Park to .071 as the Pirates amassed 21 attack errors with just 27 kills. Joao Friedrich led Park with 11 kills, while Edwardo Faquin dished out 25 assists.

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