Unranked UC Irvine, which has a losing record but has now won four in a row, lost the first two sets Thursday to visiting No. 2 Long Beach State. But the Anteaters stormed back to win their Big West men’s volleyball opener in five.
Also Thursday, No. 4 Hawai’i of the Big West made short work of visiting No. 12 Lewis of the EIVA, and No. 5 UC Santa Barbara swept its Big West match with CSUN.
Recaps of Wednesday’s and Thursday’s matches follow, but first a look at Friday’s NCAA Division I-II schedule.
There’s just more than a month left to the regular season, but many teams are playing nonconference matches.
In the Big West, Long Beach State gets a chance to bounce back when UCI makes the 20-mile trek to the Pyramid, and UCSB goes 79 miles to Northridge for the return match with CSUN.
In the MPSF, No. 1 UCLA is home for Stanford, and Concordia Irvine goes to BYU. Also, No. 7 Pepperdine of the MPSF plays host to George Mason of the EIVA.
The MIVA’s Ball State, ranked No. 8, goes to the EIVA’s NJIT, which entered the AVCA poll this week at No. 15. McKendree of the MIVA goes to independent Limestone, Purdue Fort Wayne of the MIVA is at Charleston of the EIVA, and Lindenwood of the MIVA is home for independent Lincoln Memorial.
Other EIVA teams in action include: Sacred Heart home for independent LIU, Saint Francis (PA) home for independent Fairleigh Dickinson, and St. Francis Brooklyn at Division III SUNY New Paltz.
The only Conference Carolinas team playing Friday is Emmanuel, home for independent Alderson Broaddus.
There are two SIAC matches — Benedict is at Central State, and Edward Waters is at Kentucky State.
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ANTEATERS REVERSE SWEEP — UC Irvine (7-8, 1-0) won its fourth in a row, 19-25, 23-25, 25-17, 25-22, 15-12 against Long Beach State (10-3, 0-1).
UCI, which hit .268, had a season-high 12 aces and 17 serving errors. Cole Gillis led the team with 18 kills and hit .364 to go with three assists, an ace, three blocks and six digs. Hiler Henno had a career-high six aces, 17 kills, hit .324, and added an assist, two blocks and three digs. Francesco Sani had 13 kills, two assists, two aces, three blocks and four digs. Patrick Vorenkamp had 49 assists, three aces and nine digs.
Long Beach, which held a 12-8 blocking advantage, hit .269 and had five aces and 16 errors. Spencer Olivier led with 18 kills and hit .366, with just three errors in 41 attacks. He added an assist, five blocks and two digs. Alex Nikolov had 18 kills, hit .306, and had four assists, three aces, three blocks and four digs. Clarke Godbold had 11 kills, an assist, five blocks and six digs. Aidan Knipe had a kill, 40 assists, a block and four digs.
THURSDAY — Hawai’i (15-3) hit .424 and beat visiting Lewis 25-15, 25-21, 25-19. UH, which won at home for the 18th time in a row, had five aces and nine errors.
Spyros Chakas led with 14 kills and hit .440 after having three errors in 25 attacks. He had two aces, a block and six digs. Dimitrios Mouchlias had 12 kills, hit .360 and added a dig and two blocks, one solo. Max Rosenfeld, Chaz Galloway and Guillherme Voss had six kills each. Voss had no errors in nine attacks and two blocks. Jakob Thelle had three kills in as many tries, 40 assists, two aces and five digs.
Lewis (10-7) hit .222 and had no aces and seven errors. Max Roquet had 11 kills, a block and six digs in the loss, and Tyler Mitchem had seven kills, a dig and four blocks, two solo …
UC Santa Barbara (13-4, 2-0) overpowered visiting CSUN, which was playing its Big West opener. The Gauchos hit .429 in the 25-18, 25-17, 25-17 victory. Ryan Wilcox had 15 kills and hit .667 with one error in 21 attacks. He added an assist, three aces, six digs and two blocks. UCSB had eight aces — four by Patrick Paragas — and 11 errors. Paragas had 31 assists, a block and six digs. CSUN (5-5, 0-1) hit .282 and had two aces and 14 errors. Kyle Houbos had nine kills and hit .438 …
King (8-9) of Conference Carolinas swept at independent Tusculum (5-11). Suetonius Harris led King with 15 kills, hit .423 and added two aces, a block and five digs.
WEDNESDAY — Fifth-ranked USC (14-3) of the MPSF beat visiting George Mason (7-8) of the EIVA 25-16, 25-20, 25-16 as Sam Kobrine led a balanced attack with 11 kills. Kobrine hit .391 and had an assist, three aces, two blocks and four digs. Chris Hall had 31 assists, an ace, three blocks and eight digs. USC hit .389 and had five aces and 16 errors. Mason hit .085 and had three aces and 16 errors …
UC San Diego (9-7) of the Big West won 20-25, 25-19, 28-26, 30-28 at Concorida Irvine (8-6) of the MPSF. The No. 10 Tritons got 20 kills from Kyle McCauley, who also had an assist, five aces, two blocks and eight digs. UCSD hit .256 and had eight aces and 15 errors. Ryan Ka had 13 kills, an assist, seven digs and two blocks, one solo. Shane Benetz had nine kills, hit .353, and had seven blocks, one solo. Ben Blakely had seven kills, 10 digs and four blocks, one solo. Blake Crisp had 49 assists, an ace, two blocks and seven digs, and Matt Palma had 11 digs and four assists. CUI hit .206 and had five aces and 11 errors. Owen Chun led the team with 18 kills, an assist, an ace, three digs and six blocks, three solo. Jonathan Carlson had 11 kills, two aces, two blocks and 11 digs …
Maryville (19-11) and Benedict (2-9) split their two matches. Benedict of the SIAC won in four as Benjamin Attles had 15 kills. Then Maryville won in four behind 13 kills by Jacob Fisher and 12 by Victor Ganeve … Lees-McRae (6-7) swept visiting independent Alderson Broaddus (3-9) behind 14 kills from Michael Marsans … Caden Satterfield had 20 kills and hit .621 as independent LIU (5-14) swept visiting Edward Waters (3-15) of the SIAC.
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