SOUTH EUCLID, Ohio – After playing in three different tournaments to start the season, Notre Dame College played their first Mountain East Conference opponent on Friday night, losing to Urbana University 3-0.

The Falcons (6-8, 0-1 MEC) fall to 2-3 in conference openers since joining the Mountain East Conference in 2013. The Blue Knights (6-7, 1-0) have now won six of their last seven games and improve to 12-2 all-time against Notre Dame.

Notre Dame head coach Troy Haught coached at Urbana for three seasons before joining NDC, so he knew Urbana would come out tough.

"It's always competitive since I used to coached there and this is the senior class that was my last recruiting class so I know, for them, it means a little more. I expected them to play us extremely tough because this is their last time playing me here," Haught said.

The first set was very competitive early on with five ties and four lead changes. NDC tied the game at six with a kill by sophomore Mary Kate McHugh. Urbana then scored five of the next six points and the closest the Falcons would get the rest of the way was one point (11-10) off an attack error by Taylor Clark. An attack error by sophomore Natalie Spadaro put UU up 16-11 and NDC took a timeout. Notre Dame hung with the Blue Knights but Urbana scored the final four points to close out the 25-19 victory.

In the second set, Urbana University came out and took the first three points. After a bad set by Anna Davis, NDC found themselves down 3-2. Urbana then put together an 11-7 run, going up 14-9. Later in the set, down 23-17, the Falcons went on a 5-0 run to pull within one point, thanks in part to three kills by senior Melissa Maczuzak. However, Urbana scored two of the last three points, with two kills, and won the set 25-23.

Notre Dame struggled to get going in the third set after staying with Urbana early. Notre Dame held the lead twice (4-3 and 8-7) using three errors and two service aces to help boost them over the Blue Knights. Urbana's 13-2 run closed the door on Notre Dame quickly as UU received help from Katlynn Dunlap, who had three consecutive service aces at one point, and three kills from Emilee Skerbetz. NDC would only score 12 points the rest of the game and Urbana did not back down. The Blue Knights won the third set by a final score of 25-12.

For the Falcons, Maczuzak recorded 13 kills and five digs while sophomore Paige Staudacher had 20 assists. NDC held an attack percentage of .063.

"We just didn't come out competitively, at the end of the day. I thought defensively, Ali Kaeberlein played really well, but offensively, we cannot solely rely on Mel [Maczuzak] and that's what we did tonight," said Haught, after the game. "Urbana played solid, I'll give them that. But as a team, we just did not show up. We didn't block, we didn't hit, everything that we had worked on, the game plan we had had, we didn't do anything that we practiced this week and it showed."

Skerbetz had 10 kills for Urbana and Katlynn Dunlap had 14 kills and 17 points. Maia Dunlap had 12 digs and Anna Davis added 23 assists. The Blue Knights had an attack percentage of .407.

"They rely heavily on Katlynn Dunlap and we knew that's who they would go to and that's who they went to, and we had no answer for her," Haught pointed out.

NDC will play Urbana again later this season and will have to do a lot of things better according to Haught.

"To beat them we're going to have to block a lot better and we're going to have to have more than one person attacking the ball," he said. "If everybody betters one ball and betters one point, I feel like we are very comparable to them, so I feel like we should be going four or five sets with them."

The Falcons will go on the road to play Ursuline College on September 27 in Pepper Pike, Ohio. The match is scheduled to begin at 7 p.m.