By the end of the first week of the NCAA women’s season last August, we had upsets right and left.
Not so in men’s volleyball.
The winners Saturday included the top three teams in the AVCA preseason poll — Hawai’i, UCLA and BYU — and Ohio State won a match with a new coach for the first time in 35 years.
There is one match Sunday when Division III Cal Lutheran of Thousand Oaks and Pepperdine of the MPSF open their respective seasons in Malibu. It’s the start of the 50th year of Pepperdine men’s volleyball.
Pepperdine associate head coach Paul Carroll is with the Australian national team for a couple of weeks, including at an Olympic qualifying tournament, so the retired Pepperdine former head coach, the legendary Marv Dunphy, is serving as an interim assistant coach.
That match is being streamed online. For that link and to see any match that is being shown, go to the VolleyballMag.com TV listings page.
Hawai’i of the Big West opened its season with a sweep of visiting Charleston of the EIVA on Saturday and did it again Saturday, this time 25-18, 25-16, 25-17.
Nine different Rainbow Warriors has kills. Colton Cowell led with eight and he had an assist, an ace, two digs and three blocks, one solo.
Patrick Gasman and Jakob Thelle had five kills each. Gasman hit .400 and had an ace, three blocks and a dig, while Thelle was perfect in five swings and had 19 assists, a block and a two digs. Hawai’i had six aces, 10 errors, and hit .313.
Charleston, which finished 9-20 last year, 1-13 in the EIVA, hit .164 and had no aces and 19 service errors. Jake Vorburger led with 11 kills, two blocks and a dig …Â
UCLA of the MPSF improved to 2-0 with a 25-22, 30-28, 25-23 at the EIVA’s George Mason, which was playing its season opener.Â
Daenan Gyimah led the Bruins with 12 kills and hit .381. He had two of UCLA’s eight aces, a dig and three blocks, one solo. Alex Knight had nine kills, hit .353, and had six of his team’s 24 service errors to go with five digs. Austin Matautia had eight kills, hit .375, and had four aces, a block and four digs. Matthew Younggren was good on all five of his attacks and setter Mads Kyed Jensen had five kills, hit .364, and had 32 assists, an ace, four digs and two blocks, one solo.
UCLA hit .299, while Mason hit .177. The Patriots had two aces and 15 errors.
Hayden Wagner led with 10 kills, and had an ace, five blocks and three digs. Jack Reese, who hit .364 and had six blocks, and Mike Kapusta had six kills each …Â
Davide Gardini had 19 kills and hit .400 as BYU made it 2-0 on its Chicago swing to open the season. The Cougars, who won at Loyola on Friday, moved to Romeoville and beat Lewis (1-1) 25-21, 25-21, 22-25, 25-16.
Gardini also had an assist, an ace, four blocks and six digs. Gabi Garcia Fernandez had 16 kills, an assist, a career-high seven of BYU’s 10 aces, six blocks and nine digs. Fernandez ended the second set with four aces in a row.
Setter Wil Stanley had two kills, 36 assists, two aces, five digs and three blocks, one solo.
“Tonight was a good physical and competitive match from the start,” BYU coach Shawn Olmstead said. “I was pleased with how the team managed the ebbs and flows of the match.
“Both teams made adjustments throughout the night and we responded well to those moments. Wil and Gabi were aggressive from the service line and went on some nice runs that really gave us a cushion. Gabi’s four aces in a row to finish set two were critical to the win.”
BYU hit .276 and had eight serving errors. Lewis hit .186 and had nine aces and 15 errors.
Tyler Mitchem led the Flyers with 13 kills and hit .571 after having one error in 21 attacks. He had an assist, an ace, two blocks and a dig. TJ Murray had 11 kills and hit .471 to go with three blocks. Kyle Bugee had eight kills, an assist, four aces, a block and seven digs. Kevin Kauligh had two kills in five errorless attempts, 38 assists, an ace, a block and four digs …Â
The MPSF’s Stanford, No. 7 in the AVCA preseason poll, swept the visiting UC Santa Cruz Banana Slugs 25-17, 25-18, 25-13.
Stanford hit .267 and had two aces and 11 errors. UCSC hit minus .058 and had one ace and 12 errors.
Eric Beatty led Stanford with 10 kills and hit .333. He had three blocks and six digs. Eli Wopat and Jaylen Jasper had six kills each as nine Stanford players had kills …Â
And the MIVA’s Ohio State played its season opener with a new coach, Kevin Burch, in a new facility, the Covelli Center, and dispatched North Greenville of Conference Carolinas (1-1) 25-17, 27-25, 25-19.
Ohio State hit .326 and had six aces and eight errors. North Greenville hit .268 and had three aces and 10 errors.
Reese Devilbiss led Ohio State with 11 kills and had a dig and a block. Samuel Clark had 10 kills with one error in 12 attacks and hit .750 to go with a dig and two blocks. Three players — Andrew Hillman, Martin Lallemand and Ethan Talley — had eight kills apiece. Hillman had three aces, five digs and two blocks.
North Greenville’s Jackson Gilbert had 11 kills and two aces, four digs and a block. Cade McGee had 10 kills, hit .333, and had three digs and two blocks.Â
