LORETTO, Pa. – The Norfolk State volleyball team lost twice on the second and final day of the Red Flash Classic on Saturday. In the first match, Saint Francis topped the Spartans by a 3-0 score before NSU fell by a 3-1 margin to Bucknell several hours later.
 
Host Saint Francis improved to .500 on the season with a morning win against the Spartans by scores of 25-10, 25-19 and 25-15. Later in the day at DeGol Arena, Bucknell and NSU traded wins in the first two sets, with the Bison coming ahead 25-19 and the Spartans rallying for a 25-23 victory in the second. Bucknell scored late to pull out a third-set win, 25-23, and it then claimed victory after taking the fourth, 25-14.
 
Emily Marcinowski and Kelsey Roush combined for 21 of the team's 33 kills to lead Saint Francis (6-6). The Spartans, meanwhile, hit in the negative with 23 kills and 24 errors. Freshman Taylor Eichelberger led the way with nine kills for NSU, which fell to 2-8 after the day's action was over.
 
Saint Francis won 19 of 23 points during a stretch in the first set on the way to the opening stanza win. In the second, kills from Eichelberger and junior Lexi Brown closed the gap to 8-7. After a 5-0 Red Flash run, the Spartans scored four straight and got a kill and block from sophomore Daiysa Burrell during that spurt to get to within two, 14-12. Saint Francis, though, slowly pulled away from there.
 
An 8-1 run for the Red Flash put the Spartans in a big hole early in the third set. NSU got no closer than five the rest of the way.
 
Senior Melvina Brown added 14 digs, and senior Clarke Tyler added four blocks. Brown was later named to the all-tournament team.
 
Saint Francis hit .241 for the match.
 
Eichelberger and freshman Clara Kick each had 12 kills in the second match of the day against Bucknell (6-6). Kick hit .393 with three blocks. Tyler added eight kills for a Spartan squad that hit .157 for the afternoon.
 
Bucknell attacked at a .215 clip, with Sophie Bullard (17 kills, .368 hitting percentage), Stefanie Alpert (12 kills, .240 hitting percentage) and Hailey Stout and Mimi Richards (10 kills each) leading the Bison on offense.
 
Kick played a big part in NSU taking the second set, including at the end when she had two kills and a block during a 4-0 run that changed the score from 23-21 in favor of Bucknell to the final 25-23 margin. Kick had four kills in the set, which started with NSU up by two at 7-5 thanks in part to two kills from Tyler and ones from freshman Jazmine Craig and Eichelberger on two straight plays.
 
Bucknell won four of five points a short time later, but Burrell had back-to-back kills during a 5-0 run to extend the lead to three for NSU. But the set continued on with wild momentum swings. Bucknell won four straight, followed immediately by the Spartans winning three straight for a 19-17 edge. The Bison then won six of the next eight points before Norfolk State closed the set on the 4-0 run.
 
Tyler had a pair of kills during a 5-1 run, and Eichelberger finished it off with a kill of her own for an 8-7 Spartan lead to start the match. The Bison, though, scored eight of the next 10 to jump ahead. The Spartans cut the Bucknell lead to two as late as 18-16, but the Bison were not threatened the rest of the set.
 
In the third, NSU fell behind by a 10-5 score before Eichelberger had three kills during a 6-0 run. She added two more kills that led to a 15-14 advantage, and Eichelberger followed two kills from Tyler with a kill of her own to later tie the score at 21-all. A kill from Kick and an error on Bucknell made it 23-22 in favor of NSU, but the Bison got a pair of kills from Alpert as they won the last three points.
 
Eichelberger had six kills in that third set alone.
 
After the Spartans had cut the Bucknell lead to 8-6 in the fourth, the Bison used a 9-2 run to pull ahead by nine on the way to a comfortable 11-point win in the final stanza.
 
Melvina Brown totaled 21 digs, and sophomore Jill Aquino tallied 31 assists.
 
NSU will host Savannah State next Friday at Gill Gymnasium at 7 p.m. for its home opener. The match will be part of the MEAC North-South Challenge that will also include contests against South Carolina State and North Carolina A&T on Saturday at the Tidewater Volleyball Center.