Second-ranked Hawai’i, No. 3 UC Irvine, No. 5 Pepperdine — despite 28 kills from Grand Canyon’s David Kisiel — and No. 6 UC Santa Barbara all won Friday in NCAA Division I-II men’s volleyball.
And now the focus turns to a huge non-conference match Saturday, as No. 1 Long Beach State of the Big West plays host to No. 4 UCLA of the MPSF. Long Beach is 12-0 and has gotten every first-place vote this season in the AVCA polls. The Beach swept UCLA (10-3) in their previous meeting, almost a month ago at UCLA.
It’s the only match involving a Big West team on Saturday, but there are two MPSF matches as No. 9 Stanford plays host to Concordia and No. 8 BYU is home for No. 14 USC.
There are three MIVA matches. No. 7 Loyola is home for No. 12 Ball State, No. 10 Lewis is home for No. 15 Purdue Fort Wayne and Ohio State goes to Quincy.
The busy EIVA schedule has the league’s only ranked team, No. 13 George Mason, at Princeton, Harvard at Saint Francis and Sacred Heart at Penn State. Charleston plays a non-conference match against Queens.
There are three Conference Carolinas matches as King goes to Mount Olive, Belmont Abbey plays at Emmanuel and Lees-McRae is at Barton.
UCSB (13-3) won its Big West opener with a 25-21, 25-19, 25-18 victory at UC San Diego (5-9, 0-3).
UCSB won its 10th in a row and recorded its fifth sweep in six matches. Corey Chavers led with 12 kills, two aces, five digs and a block. Ryan Wilcox had nine kills, an ace, five digs and three blocks.
“They’re always a good team. Kevin (Ring) is a good coach, he has them ready, I know that they’re going to be taking away our tendencies,” UCSB coach Rick McLaughlin said. “I think that they didn’t have a lot left after a tough loss last night. They battled Irvine to five, 16-14 in the fifth, fortunately for us, I don’t think we caught the real San Diego tonight.”
Collin Shannon had 12 kills, four digs and four blocks, one solo, for UCSD, while Wyatt Harrison had 10 kills …
There were two Big West teams in non-conference action as Hawai’i (9-0)swept independent Lincoln Memorial (7-5) and CSUN (8-6) did the same to Cal Lutheran (4-7).
Hawai’i hit .667, a program record, with just three errors in 51 attempts in the 25-12, 25-14, 25-12 victory. Colton Cowell led with nine kills. Stijn van Tilburg had eight …
Maciej Ptaszynski had 13 kills for CSUN while hitting .706 in its 25-21, 25-15, 25-18 victory …
Pepperdine (10-2, 3-0) won a wild MPSF match at Grand Canyon (7-8, 0-3), pulling out a 15-25, 25-19, 23-25, 25-19, 15-12 victory.
Michael Wexter came up big with 19 kills while hitting .325. He had four of Pepperdine’s 10 aces to go with an assist and seven digs. David Wieczorek had 17 kills, three of those aces, four digs and two blocks. GCU, which lost despite hitting .373 while the Waves hit .203, got that remarkable line from Kisiel, who had 28 kills with seven errors in 50 swings to hit .420. However, he had no aces and 10 errors to go with six blocks and five digs. Will Schwob had 10 kills, six digs and four blocks …
Loyola and Lewis won MIVA matches while Ohio State continued its downward spiral.
Loyola (10-3, 3-0) beat visiting Purdue Fort Wayne (8-6, 2-1) 20-25, 25-21, 25-21, 25-13 as Collin Mahan had 15 kills, hit .483, and had five digs. Paul Narup had 11 kills with one error in 15 swings and hit .667 to go with six blocks, three solo. Kyle Piekarski had 10 kills with one error in 14 attacks and hit .643. The Ramblers hit .404, while PFW hit just .167. Pelegrin Vargas led the Mastodons with 13 kills …
Lewis (10-4, 3-0) stayed atop the league with Loyola by dispatching Ball State (7-6, 1-2) 25-23, 25-21, 25-17. The Flyers hit .432 as Tyler Mitchem had 11 kills with no errors in 13 swings. He hit .846 to go with two digs and three blocks. Ryan Coenen had 10 kills, hit .364, and had an ace, six digs and four blocks, one solo. TJ Murray’s line included six kills while hitting .556 to go with four blocks. Matt Szews led Ball State with 12 kills …
Lindenwood (5-9, 1-3) dealt a 25-23, 25-19, 25-17 defeat to Ohio State (4-9, 0-3), which lost its fourth match in a row. Lindenwood hit .462, led by Phil Swartz’s 12 kills. He hit .529 and had an ace, a dig and three blocks. Charley Hlavin had nine kills with one error in 15 swings and hit .500 to go with an ace, seven digs and three blocks. Ohio State, which hit .190, got nine kills from Jack Stevens, eight from Sean Ryan and seven from Blake Leeson …
In the EIVA, George Mason (9-2, 3-0) swept NJIT (4-5, 0-1) 25-14, 25-23, 25-18. Hayden Wagner led with 13 kills and hit .435 and had an assist, three digs and five blocks, one solo. Kyle Barnes had nine kills and six digs. Alvaro Gimeno led NJIT with 11 kills, three assists, two aces, and seven digs …
Penn State (6-5, 2-0) kept pace as it swept Harvard (1-7, 1-1) 25-20, 25-21, 25-15 behind 13 kills by Jason Donorovich, who hit .688 and had an assist, three digs and three blocks, one solo. Matthew McLaren had 12 kills, hit .471, and Brett Wildman had 11 kills …
Saint Francis (7-5, 1-1) swept Sacred Heart (1-6, 0-2) 25-22, 25-14, 25-22. Patrick Bryan led SFU with 15 kills and hit .455 to go with an assist and three digs. Evan Feltz had 11 kills, an assist, three digs and two blocks …
In Conference Carolinas, Barton (8-3, 4-1) swept King (6-5, 4-2), Mount Olive (5-6, 5-1) did the same to Lees-McRae (1-9, 0-7) and Belmont Abbey (7-3, 3-2) knocked off Erskine (4-10, 3-4) in four. Also, Emmanuel lost a non-league match to Webber International.
Angelos Mandilaris had 13 kills for Barton and hit .333 to go with four digs and four blocks, while his brother Vasilis had 11 kills, hit .438, and added four assists, an ace, three digs, and two blocks, one solo … Ivanu Adebisi had 13 kills for Mount Olive … Liam Maxwell had 18 kills and hit .405 to go with two assists, two aces, and five digs.
