The specific complexion and contours of their meeting Friday changed, but the basic outlined played to the history books, as the Marauders and Trinity Western Spartans battled through a tightly-fought contest with the Canada West powerhouse ultimately coming out on top.

McMaster laid down a dominant third set with its back against the wall, but fell off the pace late in the fourth to fall 15-25, 25-27, 25-17, 17-25 to Trinity Western in the teams' U SPORTS quarterfinal in Quebec.

The Marauders remain winless in six meetings against the Spartans at the national championship tournament. Testament to the quality of their contests, the teams have never played a three-set match at the tournament.

"The second set could have gone either way," said McMaster head coach Dave Preston. "It is what it is. It's sport. But we had an opportunity down the stretch to make a couple of those plays. But we battled through the middle of that match really, really well."

"I'm still really proud of our guys."

Friday's result snaps a streak of six consecutive Marauders appearances in the national semifinals.

Instead, McMaster heads to the consolation side of the championship bracket, and will play a rematch of the OUA final in meeting the Queen's Gaels on Saturday at 3:00 p.m.

Third-year middle Dylan Romero Marshall, who made his first start at the U SPORTS Championship Friday, was named as the Marauders Player of the Match after cobbling together a career night offensively.

Romero Marshall racked up 14 kills versus just four errors on 28 attempts (.357), and added two aces and four block assists for good measure.

"In our preparations for this match, we realized that if we were going to be successful tonight, we were going to have to be successful attacking up the middle of the court," said Preston. "Dylan Romero Marshall is one of the best on our team at doing that, and we wanted to give him the chance he's earned this year."

With the middle alleviating some of his attacking load, right side Matt Passalent collected 13 kills but saw his usual efficiency curtailed by the Spartans and had seven errors.

Making his first appearance at the national championship, setter Pearson Stiller started and played the entirety of Friday's match with 35 assists to show for his creative efforts.

"Pearson played very well tonight. I think he did exactly what we wanted him to do from a game plan perspective and was very engaged. He's a great player and a great setter, he just hasn't had a lot of opportunities because we haven't had our full lineup available to us for most of the season."

"We're still in the midst of putting things together, and my fear came to fruition with this group, that we would run out of the time to get where we wanted to as a group. We ran out of season to work with."

The teams erased a strange historical quirk Friday, one that had seen the Marauders win the opening set of each of their five previous meetings against the Spartans before ultimately losing out.

Instead, McMaster took an early 4-2 lead in the first, after Passalent knocked down his first kill of the night in emphatic fashion, but soon found itself off the pace.

With the Spartans beginning to find their rhythm, the Marauders did themselves no favours with a rash of errors just before the technical timeout, and arrived at the break down five after a miscommunication on second contact.

Mac produced an encouraging late sequence to make things interesting, pulling within five points again at 14-19 when Andrew Richards combined a stutter-step approach with a slow-guided shot for a crafty kill.

But Trinity Western's quality won out in the end, and the Spartans brought the set to a close when Jacob Kern sealed the inside of a double block to deny Craig Ireland on the pin.

Undeterred by a lopsided conclusion to the first, the Marauders emerged strongly in the second set, and took an early lead they continued to nurture with steady play and a stutter across the net.

Trinity Western coach Ben Josephson burned the second of his two timeouts when the Spartans were called for a net violation and the Marauders led 18-14. But momentum was shifting, and McMaster had to call a timeout of its own when a bad pass brought Trinity Western within one at 19-18.

Enjoying one set point of their own at 24-23, the Marauders saw it erased on a kill by the Spartans Eric Loeppky, and a few points later, he brought the set to an end by locking down Passalent for 27-25.

Heartbreakingly close in the second set, the Marauders returned to the patterns that were yielding results in the third, and found success through the middle offensively.

Bennett Swan was moving his float serve to great effect and carved out an 11-8 lead for his team, and the Spartans scrambled to a timeout with the Marauders leading 13-9 after overcooking a shot through the middle.

Looking for a truly decisive lead, the Marauders found it when Richards unloaded on a pair of kills to push his team ahead 18-11. That proved to be too much for the Spartans to claw back, and after the Marauders locked up a triple block for 24-16, Romero Marshall killed a tight set for 25-17 and forced a fourth.

Romero Marshall's emergence in set three was a major development for the Marauders, as he killed six of eight attempts without an error in the frame.

The fourth set was shaping up to be another see-saw battle, as Trinity Western held just a two-point lead at the technical timeout. But after a Dylan Romero-Marshall kill brought the Marauders within one at 16-17, the margins tilted against the OUA side.

Suddenly struggling to triangulate their offence and keep the Spartans at bay, the Marauders won just one more point Friday, as Trinity Western booked its spot in the national semifinals.

NEXT UP: McMaster meets the Queen's Gaels in a consolation semifinal at 3:00 p.m. on Saturday, March 16. Queen's won both previous matchups between the two teams this season, taking both in five sets.