Rowan volleyball returned to Esbjornson Gymnasium on Tuesday, Sept. 24, to take on Stockton in their first New Jersey Athletic Conference (NJAC) match of the season.

The Profs returned to Glassboro after a disappointing outing at the Messiah Quad in Grantham, Pennsylvania, which saw the team getting swept in their trio of matches against Gettysburg (10-1, 0-0 Centennial), and Cortland (9-2, 0-0 State University of New York Athletic Conference).

Things didn’t get much better against Stockton, as the Profs suffered a 3-1 loss, marking their fourth straight in addition to their first one at home this season, bringing their record to 5-7 on the year and 0-1 in the NJAC.

To kick off conference play, the Profs faced an Ospreys (10-0, 1-0 NJAC) team who finished first in the NJAC last season with an 8-0 conference record. They traveled to the NJAC finals but finished second to Ramapo in the championship match.

“It’s awesome to start playing in the NJAC because it gets down to figuring out how good you are and where you’re going to go,” head coach Deana Jespersen said. “The journey to the playoffs starts now, so this is a big matchup to have early and it’s a good test to kind of figure out and see where we are.”

The Profs fell behind Stockton by two sets (25-13, 25-17) to start off the match, finishing with 11 kills.

Rowan came out firing to begin the third set. An 8-0 run with an ace by Vanessa Hutchinson got the Profs out to a 14-9 lead, but Stockton inched their way back into the running making it 22-18, with two kills from Ciara Bradley in a three-point span ending the Ospreys’ hopes of a comeback and forcing a fourth set.

“I think that the biggest standout moment for me is how much we [the team] grew up in that match and how we didn’t let the fact that they [Stockton] were up two sets hurt us at all,” senior Brooke Adams said. “It can be easy when a team like Stockton is up two sets against you to just fold, but we really did a good job of coming back.”

In the fourth set, there were eight lead changes. After 16 ties and the back-and-forth continued, the Profs were up 24-22 with the match point on the line. However, the Ospreys were able to capitalize on a kill from Nicole Palmer to win the fourth set and the match 3-1.

Palmer finished the night with a triple-double, including a match-high 14 kills, 14 assists, and 11 digs.

On the Profs side, Jena Kaul finished with seven kills, followed by Bradley (6), Maya Iovacchini (6), and Ava Best (5). Adams added 26 assists and 12 digs for a double-double, with Hutchinson collecting a match-high 17 digs.

Despite the losing streak the Profs currently find themselves in, Jespersen is certain her team is not done fighting.

“We proved that we’re super resilient and we’re experienced,” Jespersen said. “We’re starting to kind of formulate our identity and I’m starting to notice that we are resilient and we can play with confidence. I think this is the beginning and we’re going to continue to rise in the face of those kinds of challenges.”

In the eyes of Adams, things will only get better following their match against Stockton.

“It was a really good match to start with even though we didn’t win. It now matters how we bounce back from that,” Adams said. “We have a game on Thursday against a non-conference opponent, then next week we have Ramapo, who won [NJAC Championship] last year. This was a good test for us, and we really showed up and played.”

The Profs next test will come against Muhlenberg at home on Thursday, Sept. 26 at 7 p.m.

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