Philadelphia, Pa. - With PSAC play just around the corner this weekend, the Millersville volleyball team needed to play well against non-conference foe Philadelphia. The Marauders did just that by sweeping the Rams in straight sets Tuesday night inside the Gallagher Athletic Center.

Millersville improved to 6-2 on the young season after defeating PhilaU (2-4) with set scores of 25-20, 25-23 and 26-24. The Marauders improved to 6-2 all-time against Philadelphia which includes three wins in the last four meetings.

In a first set that saw six ties and two lead changes, the visitors hit .281 to just .108 by their hosts. However, Millersville's first lead didn't come until 14-13 as part of a 6-2 run, which forced the Rams to call a timeout. Four of those six points came on errors from PhilaU. The final tie of the first set came at 15-15 before the Marauders scored 10 of the next 15 points to take the first set. Katie Lesinski sent home four kills in that stretch alone.

The Rams opened the second set with a similar mindset and were up 8-2 before a 15-4 run by Millersville that put it ahead 17-12 and silenced the Philadelphia faithful. However, PhilaU fought all the way back with a 9-3 run of its own to go up 21-20 and Marauder head coach Brian Smith stopped play with a timeout to talk things over. The last tie in the second set was 22-22 until Millersville scored three of the final four points to take the set and a two sets to none lead. Both teams hit very well in the set as the Rams had a red-hot attack percentage of .414 to .343 by the away team.

Philadelphia opened the third set with another fury and was up 10-3 over the Marauders. The closest Millersville could get was four points before it cut the deficit to three, 23-20, as part of a 6-2 run and PhilaU called a timeout. The Marauders came out of the breather with the same intentions and tallied six of the final seven points to take the set and the match in straight sets.

Offensively, Lesinski led the way with 14 kills to just four errors on 23 total attacks for a blistering hitting percentage of .435. The Schwenksville, Pa. native is now 12 kills away from 1,000 for her career and would become the eighth player to reach that milestone in program history. Erin Harman sent home seven kills with only two errors on 18 attacks for a .278 clip. Victoria Biggins tallied 34 assists and continues to have a stellar freshman campaign. The 5-4 setter has registered at least 23 assists in each of Millersville's eight matches. Defensively, Brooklyn Smith dug out 11 balls while Mary Paul had one solo block to go with four assisted.

The Marauders open conference action on Friday and Saturday with four matches in two days. Day one, Millersville will square up against Clarion (11:30 a.m.) and IUP (7:30 p.m.) before facing Seton Hill (10 a.m.) and California (6 p.m.) on the second day.