Julian Perez and Jace Milka celebrating against Adrian Feb. 9, 2024

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Men’s Volleyball Heads North to No. 11 North Central

Titans face the Cardinals at 7 p.m. inside Gregory Arena

4/1/2024 1:30:00 PM

BLOOMINGTON, Ill. - After enjoying a week off, the Illinois Wesleyan University men's volleyball team heads to the suburbs of Chicago to take on 11th-ranked North Central College Wednesday, April 3, for a College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin bout. The Titans (10-13, 1-7 CCIW) will face the Cardinals (13-8, 3-5 CCIW) at 7 p.m. inside Gregory Arena.

Illinois Wesleyan enters the contest off a three-set loss to Carthage College Wednesday, March 27. Senior Michael Eastman (Chicago, Ill.-Saint Ignatius) led the match with 14 kills on a .314 clip, while freshman Bryce Williams (Chicago, Ill.-Whitney M. Young) finished with 12 kills on a .348 clip. Freshman Brenden Reutter (Frankfort, Ill.-Lincoln-Way East) posted 17 assists, while Reutter and Williams each notched a team-high eight digs.

Eastman has paced the Titan offense all season, having recorded a team-high 231 kills on a .261 clip, averaging 3.25 kills per set. Williams is second on the squad with 169 kills, an average of 2.45 kills per set, and junior Jake Kougan (Frankfort, Ill.-Lincoln-Way East) is third with 106. Eastman is also the team leader in aces with 25, followed by Kougan's 16, and senior Bradley Benson (Lemont, Ill.-Lemont Township) with 13.

IWU has seen junior Vince DiCosola (Aurora, Ill.-Oswego East) and Reutter put together the majority of the Titan offense. DiCosola leads the way with 336 assists, an average of 5.01 per set, while Reutter has 283 assists, averaging 4.49 per set.

Defensively, sophomore Jace Milka (Bolingbrook, Ill.-Plainfield East) has accumulated a team-best 183 digs, averaging 2.38 per set. Eastman is second with 113, followed by Williams with 94. At the net, Kougan's 45 blocks are the most on the Titan squad, while seniors Javier Romano (Prospect Heights, Ill.-Wheeling) and Julian Perez (Orland Park, Ill.-Carl Sandburg) are second and third with 41 and 33 rejections, respectively.

This will be the eighth meeting between the two programs, with North Central holding the upperhand in all previous matches. The Cardinals took the most recent contest in straight sets Saturday, March 16. Eastman posted 11 kills on a .400 attack percentage, along with five digs, while DiCosola led the Green and White with 18 assists. NCC enters the match off a five set loss to No. 13 University of California, Santa Cruz Saturday, March 30.

North Central will be live streaming the match, which can be found here, and live stats can be accessed by clicking here.

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