WESTON, Mass. – The Rivier men's volleyball team rallied from 2-0 down to force a fifth set, but Regis (Mass.) would hold on for a 15-12 fifth set win to knock the Raiders out of the Great Northeast Athletic Conference (GNAC) Tournament in the quarterfinal round on Tuesday night at Higgins Court.

The Raiders fell by set scores of 15-25, 23-25, 25-15, 25-22, 12-15 in cap off their season with a 11-17 overall record. The Pride improved to 20-11 with the victory and advance to Thursday night's semifinal matchup against the conference's top seed, Wentworth.

Rivier failed to get in an offensive groove in the opening set and allowed the hosts to produce a .333 hitting percentage to fall behind. Sophomore Tyler Dickinson recorded two first-set kills on two attempts.

First-year Nilson Perez notched a kill to make it 8-8 in the second. From there, Regis began to slowly separate but couldn't pull ahead by more than three points as the Pride narrowly took the second set, 25-23, to give themselves 2-0 lead.

With their season on the line, the Raiders battled to take the third set in convincing fashion. Rivier got out to a 12-5 lead, forcing Regis into an early timeout, and led by as many as ten points by the next Pride timeout. Following the break at 21-11, Rivier used kills from sophomore Aidan Combs and Racine Camara coupled with multiple Regis errors to extend the match. Combs ammased two kills at a .667 clip in the third as sophomore Cade Barron passed out nine assists.

The fourth set saw eight tie scores and a late lead change as first-year Cody Fitzpatrick and Combs combined for consecutive kills to put the Raiders up 20-19. Regis called a timeout trailing 22-20 before Dickinson's ace and a kill from senior Bassam Awde sent it to set point. The Pride attempted a late comeback bid, scoring the next two points before a serve into the net propelled the match into a fifth and final frame. Fitzpatrick paced the offense with three kills at a .750 clip in the fourth.

Rivier trailed by just two, 8-6, at the switch and elected to use a timeout to regroup. From there, Rivier whittled its deficit to one point thanks to back-to-back putaways from Camara and Fitzpatrick before a two-point swing from Regis forced the Raiders to call its final timeout of the contest. After two straight Pride errors made it a 13-12 ballgame, they righted the ship with back-to-back kills to close out the match and advance to the semifinals for the first time since joining the GNAC in 2018.

Combs led Rivier with a .364 hitting percentage, notching five kills. Fitzpatrick hit .300 as he dropped in eight kills on 20 attempts. Camara posted a 13-kill, 10-dig double-double in the setback. Sophomore libero Luis Castillo posted a team-high 14 digs.