In front of its home crowd at the Events Center, the No. 1-seeded Binghamton volleyball team was upset by No. 4 Albany in the America East semifinals on Friday night. Despite going into championship weekend undefeated on their home floor in conference play, the Bearcats suffered a four-set loss to the Great Danes, resulting in their elimination from the AE tournament.

“It just wasn’t our day,” said Binghamton head coach Allie Yaeger. “Albany played outstanding against us. We couldn’t get anything to drop. They dug every single hard swing that we put over at them, and they came back even harder at us.”

Albany (12-15, 5-5 AE) came out of the gate hot in the first set with a 6-0 run, but a kill from fifth-year outside hitter Tsvetelina Ilieva ended the run to get Binghamton (19-10, 8-2 AE) on the board. The Bearcats recovered from the early deficit with timely kills and blocks to cut the Great Danes’ lead to 16-14. BU tied the set at 21 and then took the lead at 23-22 with back-to-back kills from freshman right side hitter Viktoria Dimitrova and sophomore outside hitter Ella Schabort. Another kill from Schabort secured BU’s 25-22 set win, sending the Events Center crowd into a frenzy.

“It was hard,” Yaeger said. “Albany was playing relentless. We just had to continue to fight and we did fight. Even in the first set, we were down a lot, and we came back and we won, and we made everything close.”

Despite having the momentum from set one, Binghamton got off to a slow start once again in set two, as Albany jumped out to a 10-3 lead. The Bearcats’ offense struggled to get things going, being held to just a .032 hitting percentage. Meanwhile, the Great Danes tallied 15 kills with a .464 hitting percentage en route to a 25-12 set win.

“[Albany] just played great defense,” Yaeger said. “They dug everything. They won the serve and pass game.”

Going into set three, the Bearcats scored four unanswered points to begin the set. Binghamton kept things rolling from there as the set stayed close, with a kill from Dimitrova and a block by sophomore middle blocker Misa Dlouha to help BU regain the lead at 12-11. Later in the frame, trailing 18-15, Binghamton strung a 3-0 run to tie it back up. However, Albany gained momentum late to stun the Bearcats and win set three 25-21.

“At times we just got down too much,” Yaeger said. “It’s just unacceptable for us to get down by seven or eight points and then have to claw and fight our way back the entire match. It was brutal at times. We didn’t have answers.”

Binghamton went up 8-2 in the early going, but Albany climbed back with a 7-1 run to tie the set at 15. From there on out, the Great Danes maintained a slight lead with a 4-0 run that propelled them to a 20-17 advantage. While the Bearcats battled back with three straight points to tie the set at 23, those were the final points for the hosts as Albany won the final two points to take the set and earn the victory overall.

“[Albany] took us out of system and we couldn’t serve hard enough,” Yaeger said. “They were in system a lot. So, I mean, they just played really well, and I knew they would. The deficit was too much, and we just couldn’t play well enough.”

Ilieva put together a 20-kill performance. Meanwhile, Schabort and Dlouha added nine kills of their own. While Yaeger was disappointed in the result, she expressed pride in the team’s accomplishments this past season. Hosting the AE tournament in the Events Center for the first time ever, the Bearcats made program history in multiple aspects this season.

“It was a really disappointing end for us, clearly not the results that any of us wanted,” Yaeger said. “It doesn’t take away all the great things that we did this season. We couldn’t have asked for better support from our student-athletes and our coaches, our administration and the community.”

As a result of winning the AE regular season title, Binghamton’s season will continue at the National Invitational Volleyball Championship against an opponent to be decided.

“I’m excited to play in it for sure,” Yaeger said. “It’s not the main goal. The main goal was obviously to win and go to the NCAA tournament. But it’s an honor to also be invited to this and there’s been some big-time names that have won this tournament.”