Rio Grande Sports Information
BOURBONNAIS, Ill. - The University of Rio Grande men's volleyball team opened its 2026 season by splitting its two games in Thursday's opening round of the Olivet Nazarene University Invitational at McHie Arena.
The RedStorm started with a 25-20, 25-23, 25-17 sweep of Judson (Ill.) University before falling in straight sets to Dordt (Iowa) 25-15, 28-26, 25-18.
In the opener against Judson, Rio never trailed in the opening set before scoring four of the final five winners to erase a 22-21 deficit.
Set three saw the RedStorm use a 5-0 run to open up a 20-14 advantage and pull away to complete the sweep.
Junior Otavio Tonoli (Campinas, Brazil) had 11 kills to lead Rio Grande, which finished with 38 kills and 15 errors in 93 swings (.247).
Sophomore Camilo Murillo (Cali, Colombia) had 29 assists, nine digs and three service aces in the victory, while senior Josef Iten (Sacramento, CA) had two solo blocks and three block assists and freshman Samael Beltran (Colombia) had a solo block and five block assists.
Judson hit just .074 for the match, finishing with 29 kills and 22 attack errors in 94 swings.
Matthew Leith had eight kills to pace the Eagles, while Adrian Martinez had 11 assists and Jackson Otto tallied 15 digs.
Daniel Yap and Grant Shipley had two block assists each in the loss.
The nightcap saw Dordt lea most of the night and finish with a .439 attack percentage, with 32 kills and only seven errors in 57 attacks.
Rio Grande had just seven more kills (31) than it had attack errors (24) and tallied a .084 swing percentage over 83 swings.
Joel Van Groningen had 14 kills in the winning effort, while Joseph Jang handed out 13 assists and Cole Schmidt had nine digs.
Cory Kuperus had a solo block and five block assists in the victory.
Sophomore Daniel Rivas (Valle Del Cauca, Colombia) had 11 kills and five digs to lead Rio Grande, while Murillo had 21 assists and four aces and senior Cam Griffith (Columbus, OH) had two block assists.
Rio Grande will wrap up its tourney run on Friday when it faces Missouri Baptist and Graceland (Iowa) University.
