How It Happened
Despite an improved effort in its second meeting with Fordham, Rhode Island could not keep up with the visitors, falling 3-1 (25-17, 26-28, 25-21, 25-18) Wednesday night.

Set One – Fordham 25, Rhode Island 17.
Whitley Moody, Lorenza Rosenkilde and Zoe Talabong each had three kills in the opening set as Fordham's offense was balanced. Rhody struggled to find a rhythm early, hitting .094 as a team with eight kills and five attack errors in the set.

Set Two – Rhode Island 28, Fordham 26
Rhode Island was much stronger in the second hitting, .170 with 16 kills and eight errors. URI fought off a set point at 24-23 with a Madi Disu kill. The teams traded points before a Hope Passerello dink gave Rhody a set point of its own. Fordham came back with a Tatum Holderied kill, but Rhode Island got a kill from Andrea Owens and a service ace from Katie Butler to take the set and even the match.

Set Three – Fordham 25, Rhode Island 21
Both teams had several surges in the third set. Fordham opened an 8-4 lead with a 4-0 run, but URI came back with its own 4-0 run that featured two aces and a kill from Samantha Blahut to tie the score at 8-8. With the score tied 12-12, Fordham scored four straight again to move in front 16-12, but once again Rhody responded with a 6-2 run to knot the score at 18-18 following back-to-back kills from Madi Disu and Megan Disu. The next three points went to Fordham, and this time Rhody could not rally. A kill from Nailah Jenkins followed by a block from Lorenza Rosenkilde and Whitley Moody capped the set.

Set Four – Fordham 25, Rhode Island 18
The fourth set was all Fordham from the start. The visitors used an 8-1 run to jump out to a 10-4 lead. Rhody managed to get within three points at 18-15 following a Fordham attack error, but that was the closest the score got the rest of the night.

Inside the Box Score

• Aerin Bowman led Rhode Island with 12 kills, her third time in double digits in the last four matches.
• She has 54 kills over her last six matches, an average of 9.0 per match. That is up from 4.9 per match in her first 14 appearances.
• With Hannah Blaney missing her first match due to an injury, Ryleigh Powers served as the libero and had career-highs with 16 digs and eight assists.
• Setters Katie Butler (16 and 8) and Hope Passerello (15 and 7) combined for 31 assists and 15 digs.
• Butler also had two service aces.
• Samantha Blahut had six blocks, five kills and four service aces.
• Megan Disu had six kills, two digs and two block assists.
• Gabrielle Shilling had seven blocks, including one solo effort. She also had five kills without an error and four digs.
• Shilling now has 284 career blocks. She needs four more to tie Abby Thornbladh (2001-2004) for 10th place in program history.
• With 16 blocks, she will be the first player in six years to reach 300 career blocks.

What's Next
Rhode Island travels to Saint Louis for two matches this weekend. The teams play Saturday at 3 p.m. EST and Sunday at 1 p.m. EST. Both matches are scheduled to stream on ESPN+.