PHILADELPHIA – The Philadelphia University women's volleyball battled hard but was defeated on Homecoming by Dominican (N.Y.), 3-2, in a Central Atlantic Collegiate Conference (CACC) match Saturday morning in the Gallagher Center.

The scores of the match were 14-25, 25-19, 25-20, 19-25, 15-10. The Lady Rams are now 8-5 overall and 4-2 in the CACC. The Lady Chargers improve to 11-7 overall and a perfect 7-0 against the conference.

Middle hitter Chelsea Hughes paced Philadelphia with eight kills and five block assists. Outside hitters Brittany Olson and Allison Manley recorded seven kills each.  Olson added a team-high 20 digs, while Manley recorded 13. Danielle Carney, Terra Ecker, Jordan Milligan and Ellie Edgar all had six-kill matches.

Setter Allyson Schillinger led the team with 19 assists, while fellow setter Heather Martin posted 16 assists and 11 digs.

Dominican's Courtney Heard recorded a match-high 15 kills. Michelle Fiorvanti had a match-high 27 digs to go along with 14 kills. Tori Dexter added 14 kills, while Jordyn Fuller had 26 digs. Whitney Ranger contributed 43 assists.

The Lady Rams controlled set one  as they didn't commit a single attack error while forcing 13 and outhit the Chargers .417 (10 kills-zero errors-24 attempts) to -.108 (9-13-37).

In the second set, Dominican took advantage of six Philadelphia errors to jump out to a 10-2 lead. The Lady Rams rallied to close the gap to 21-18, but a pair of Fiorvanti kills down the stretch helped Dominican win the set.

Back-to-back service aces by Ranger capped a 6-0 run to break open a tight third set and give the Chargers a 15-9 lead.

Dominican helped Philadelphia out early in the fourth with four errors to aid the Lady Rams in getting a 5-1 lead. The margin ballooned to 13-5 as the Lady Rams forced a ninth Dominican error. The Philadelphia defense held Dominican to a hitting percentage of .019 (11-10-54).

In the final set, the Chargers used five kills and a service ace to score six consecutive points and take a 13-7 lead.

Philadelphia returns to action with a CACC match at Goldey-Beacom on Wednesday, Oct. 3 at 7 p.m.