ROCK ISLAND – The Augustana men's volleyball team remains home on Saturday, February 18 to face the Wisconsin Lutheran Warriors. 

The Vikings improved to a 6-3 record on Tuesday night after dropping the St. Ambrose Fighting Bees 3-1 in their home opener by set scores of 25-22, 19-25, 25-21, 29-27. The opening frame was a back-and-forth battle, but a 7-4 scoring run at the end of the game helped secure Augustana's 25-22 set win. St. Ambrose would take the following set 25-19 after a 10-3 surge by the visiting team midway through the set proved to be the deciding factor. The Vikings scored five straight points early in the third set to take a 10-8 advantage, which they maintained for the remainder of the game to win 25-21. St. Ambrose opened an elongated fourth frame up four, maintaining their lead until the Vikings evened the game at 10 points all. With the game tied at 21, five ties and three lead changes followed before Augie seized control with consecutive kills to win the contest.

Augie recorded 59 kills in the match, hitting at a .268 percent clip on their attempts, led by Zach Moreano's season-high 22 kills. Matthew Degnan notched 46 assists in the contest, tying a career-best. Max Sellers added a team-high nine digs to balance Augie's defensive efforts. 

The Vikings will host Wisconsin Lutheran for the first-ever meeting on Saturday after a previously scheduled first encounter with Rockford was postponed due to weather on Thursday.

The Warriors possess a 4-8 record, most recently battling at the two-day Illinois Wesleyan Invitational, where they achieved a record of 1-3. The Warriors won their opening matchup against Maranatha Baptist 3-0 before falling in three consecutive contests to Wabash, Illinois Wesleyan, and Adrian. Wisconsin Lutheran hit at an average clip of .248 across the four matches.

Start time for the matchup is scheduled for 12:00 p.m. The stream link can be found here.