NCAA men’s volleyball: Penn St., NJIT, Harvard keep pace in EIVA; LBSU, Pepperdine, GCU, USC win

Second-ranked Penn State won in four at Princeton and still leads the EIVA by two games in the loss column. The MPSF split its two non-conference matches with Big West teams as third-ranked Long Beach State of the Big West swept Concordia Irvine and No. 7 Pepperdine of the MPSF beat CSUN.

The recaps follow, but first a look at Saturday’s NCAA Division I-II men’s schedule.

There are three MIVA matches, including No. 8 Ball State home for Ohio State two days after beating the Buckeyes in five, No. 11 Loyola Chicago at Purdue Fort Wayne and No. 12 Lewis at McKendree.

In the EIVA, NJIT is home for Charleston, Sacred Heart goes to Harvard, and Saint Francis (PA) is at Princeton. Second-ranked Penn State goes to George Mason on Sunday.

The lone match involving an MPSF team has No. 9 Grand Canyon home again for independent Tusculum. 

The Big West is off until next Friday.

Conference Carolinas has a full slate, including two league matches when Barton goes to Erskine and Mount Olive is at Emmanuel. Belmont Abbey plays twice, against Randolph Macon and Rutgers Newark, and King faces independent Queens.

In the SIAC, Edward Waters plays at Fort Valley State, while the SIAC’s Benedict plays Morehouse and Kentucky State plays Maryville.

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Penn State (16-3, 9-0) won its MIVA match at Princeton (5-12, 4-6) 25-16, 25-23, 23-25, 25-23 as the Nittany Lions hit .347. Cal Fisher led with 18 kills and hit .375 to go with seven digs and four blocks, one solo. Brett Wildman and Toby Ezeonu had eight kills each. Cole Bogner had three kills in four errorless attempts, 45 assists, two blocks and seven digs. Penn State had four aces, three by Sam Marsh, and 15 errors. Marsh had seven kills with one error in 12 attacks, three blocks and a dig. Princeton hit .239 and had seven aces and 21 errors. Ben Harrington led with 17 kills as he hit .333 and had an assist, two aces, two blocks and four digs … 

No. 15 NJIT (10-6, 5-2) swept Charleston (5-10, 2-7) and Harvard (7-8, 5-2) won in four at Sacred Heart (6-10, 1-8) to stay in a tie for second place. 

NJIT won 25-19, 26-24, 25-18 as the Highlanders hit .415 and had four aces and 16 errors. Julian Meissner led with 14 kills as he hit .426 and had an ace, three blocks and a dig. Martin De Chavarria had nine kills in 13 errorless attacks to go with seven blocks. Alessandro Negri had nine kills, hit .400, and had an ace, five blocks and four digs. Roque Nido had two kills in three errorless tries, 41 assists, two blocks and a dig. Charleston hit .152 and had no aces and six errors. Jakub Osiewala led with 14 kills …

Harvard won 23-25, 25-18, 25-14, 25-20 as the Crimson hit .333 and had three aces and 21 errors. Four players had eight or more kills, 16 by Campbell Schoenfeld. He hit .364 and had two assists, a block and eight digs. SHU hit .076 with five aces and 16 errors …

Saint Francis (PA) (12-7, 6-3) dropped a game back when it got swept at George Mason (8-10, 3-5), which hit .427 in the 25-18, 25-22, 25-22 victory.  Mason got 12 kills from Omar Hoyos, who hit .476 and had an assist, an ace, a block and four digs. Richie Hoff had 11 kills, hit .391, and had an assist, a block and three digs. The Patriots had three aces and 18 errors. SFU hit .286 and had four aces and 20 errors. Nathan Zini had 12 kills, hit .348, and had a block and four digs … 

Long Beach State (12-3) beat visiting Concordia Irvine (9-9) 25-20, 25-17. 27-25. The Beach hit .320 and had eight aces, five by Alex Nikolov, and 10 errors. Nikolov had 14 kills, three blocks and 11 digs. Spencer Olivier had 16 kills with one error in 27 attacks to hit .556 to go with a block and four digs. Aidan Knipe had 42 assists, a block and 10 digs. CUI hit .192 and had an ace and nine errors. Erik Boisvert led with nine kills, an ace, a block and seven digs … 

Pepperdine (11-6) hit .586 — a school record in the rally scoring era — and won 25-13, 25-8, 25-21 at CSUN (5-8). Alex Gettinger led Pepperdine with 13 kills as he hit .800 after having one error in 15 attacks. He added an ace and four digs. Jaylen Jasper had 10 kills in 14 errorless swings and had two blocks and six digs. Jacob Steele had nine kills, hit .353, and had a block. The Waves had two aces and 11 digs. CSUN hit .053 and had no aces and 10 errors … 

Grand Canyon (12-8) swept visiting Tusculum (5-12) as the Lopes hit .364 in the 25-15, 25-19, 25-15 victory. Nine GCU players had kills, nine by Karter Rogers, who hit .467, and had an ace and three digs. GCU hit .364 and had five aces and seven errors. Tusculum hit .101, had three aces and 14 errors. Jacob Whyte led with 10 kills … 

Fifth-ranked USC (16-3) of the MPSF swept Menlo (5-2) of the NAIA 25-12, 25-22, 25-19. The Trojans hit .425 with four aces and 13 errors. Simon Gallas led with 18 kills as he hit .533 after having two errors in 30 attacks to go with a block and two digs. Chris Hall had a kill, 33 assists, an ace, four blocks and seven digs. Menlo hit .101 and had four aces and 12 errors … 

Conference Carolinas had two league matches when Mount Olive (7-3, 5-1) swept at Erskine (8-14, 2-5) and Emmanuel (9-8, 3-3) beat visiting Barton (0-10, 0-5) in four. North Greenville (13-4) swept at independent Queens (9-9). Emmanuel’s Gustavo had 20 kills, hit .517 and had an ace despite seven serving errors, a block and five digs. Barton’s Brandon Johnston had 19 kills, an ace, two blocks and seven digs … 

The SIAC’s Fort Valley State (4-10) swept winless Morehouse … Among independents, Limestone swept Alderson Broaddus, Daemen beat Mount Union in four and D’Youville swept SUNY Potsdam. 

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VBM Staff