There were a few surprises in NCAA Division I-II men’s volleyball on Saturday, including No. 4 BYU winning at No. 2 Hawai’i and 14th-ranked UC Santa Barbara knocking off No. 10 Ball State.
But if the first day of the East Meets West Challenge in NCAA beach volleyball was any indication, Sunday’s action should be something else. And good luck to the voters in this week’s AVCA beach coaches poll after a day in which, among other results, No. 2 USC beat No. 13 FIU but lost to No. 9 LSU and No. 3 Hawai’i beat No. 20 TCU but lost to No. 5 Florida State.
Start with the men, where the only match on Sunday’s schedule has Harvard of the EIVA at USC of the MPSF.
BYU, Lewis win at Outrigger: The Cougars won at Hawai’i 20-25, 25-20, 25-21, 25-23 to improve to 17-4 with their 12th win in a row. Both teams were sharp as BYU hit .340 and Hawai’i .333.
Storm Fa’agata-Tufug led BYU with 16 kills, hit .323, had three of his team’s 11 aces, two digs and six blocks. Brenden Sander had 12 kills as he hit .310, had three aces, six digs and four blocks. And Christian Rupert had five kills in seven errorless swings and eight blocks.
Hawai’i’s Stijn van Tilburg had 16 kills, hit .355 and had four digs and tgwo blocks. Austin Matautia added 11 kills, had five of the Rainbow Warriors’ five aces, six digs and three blocks, one solo. Dalton Salbrig had six kills with no errors, an ace and six blocks.
No. 8 Lewis of the MIVA beat No. 11 Penn State of the EIVA 25-17, 22-25, 25-22, 25-22, leaving the Flyers 14-7 and Penn State 10-7.
Lewis hit .351 as Ryan Coenen had 13 kills, hit .375, and had two aces, four digs and four blocks. Julian Moses had 12 kills, three aces, five digs and two blocks. Penn State’s Aidan Albrecht had 19 kills, hit .387, an ace, three digs and two blocks, one solo.
The roundup: Start with No. 5 UCLA of the MPSF, which beat visiting George Mason of the EIVA 25-17, 25-13, 25-20.
The Bruins (17-5) hit .493 as Christian Hessenauer and Jake Arnitz had 10 kills each. Hessenauer hit .667, had two aces, six digs and a block, while Arnitz hit .600 to go with an ace, five digs and a block. Oliver Martin, Dylan Missry and Daenan Gyimah had six kills each. Martin and Missry each five blocks.
Mason (10-9) hit .123. Langston Payne led with nine kills and hit .500.
Third-ranked UC Irvine of the Big West swept Stanford of the MPSF. The 25-20, 26-24, 25-21 win at Stanford left UCI 13-5 and the Cardinal 4-16. UCI hit a whopping .531, led by Karl Apfelbach’s 10 kills. Scott Stadick added nine and two blocks, and Aaron Koubi had eight, an ace and eight digs. Stanford hit .384, led by Matt Klassen’s 10 kills.
No. 6 Loyola of the MIVA won at No. 7 Pepperdine of the MPSF 25-21, 26-24, 25-20. Loyola is 16-4, while the Wave is 10-6. Collin Mahan led Loyola with 111 kills, an ace, seven digs and a block, while Ryan Jamison had 10 kills, two aces, 11 digs and a block. Alex Harthaller led Pepperdine with 12 kills as he hit .435 to go with five digs and three blocks.
Fort Wayne of the MIVA has been ranked this season and the Mastodons won at No. 14 Concordia of the MPSF 25-15, 25-22, 25-23. Fort Wayne (15-5) hit .337, led by Tony Price. He had 15 kills, hit .625, and had an ace, five digs and two blocks. Pelegrin Vargas had 12 kills, an ace, two blocks and seven digs. Concordia (9-10) got eight kills from Raymond Barsemian.
Also in the MPSF, Grand Canyon (14-8) swept Mount Olive of Conference Carolinas (11-7)25-21, 25-22, 25-18.
Two other Big West teams won non-conference matches as UC Santa Barbara swept Ball State and No. 12 CSUN did the same to Harvard.
UCSB won 25-13, 25-17, 25-19 to improve to 9-5 as visiting Ball State of the MIVA dropped to 11-9. Keenan Sanders had 14 kills and hit .375 and had eight digs for the Gauchos. Ball State hit .071.
CSUN (10-7) rolled past Harvard of the EIVA (5-9) 25-20, 25-14, 25-23. Arvis Greene led with 12 kills and hit .391 to go with three digs and two solo blocks.
In the MIVA, McKendree (7-10) beat Saint Francis of the EIVA (8-13) 22-25, 25-23, 27-25, 27-25 and Quincy swept Graceland. Nolan Rueter had 19 kills, 11 digs and two blocks for McKendree and teammate Jared Wilcox had 16 kills, an ace, four digs and four blocks.
There was one EIVA match as Princeton 6-11, 5-4 EIVA) beat NJIT (3-13, 1-6) 26-28, 26-24, 25-14, 27-25. Parker Dixon led the Tigers with 13 kills while George Huhmann and Greg Luck had 12 each and five blocks apiece.
And in non-conference Conference Carolinas action, Mount Olive was knocked off by Ottawa and Erskine escaped Lincoln Memorial in five. Emmanuel beat Brewton-Parker 25-16,25-16, 25-12.
Beach: The Manhattan Beach Pier — albeit cold and rainy — was the place to be Saturday as No. 1 Pepperdine beat No. 5 Florida State 4-1 and then swept TCU. Click here for the Pepperdine summaries and results. Pepperdine plays LSU and FIU on Sunday.
Speaking of LSU, the Tigers lost to No. 4 UCLA 4-1, but then came back and stunned USC 4-1, losing only at No. 1, where Abril Bustamante and Tina Graudina beat Claire Coppola and Kristen Nuss. Click here for the LSU recaps and results.
Earlier, USC beat FIU 4-1 and stands 6-4 for the season. The Women of Troy plays FSU and TCU on Sunday. Click here for USC’s Saturday results.
UCLA also went 2-0, beating FIU 3-2. The Bruins clinched with a win at No. 3 when Zana Muno and Savvy Simo beat FIU’s Anabela Sataric and Madison Besterfield 17-21, 21-16, 15-11. Click here for complete UCLA results. The Bruins also play FSU and TCU on Sunday.
Florida State, which came back and beat Hawai’i, plays UCLA and then USC on Sunday.
Sixth-ranked Cal Poly went to Santa Cruz and won three matches, beating Pacific, San Francisco and Portland. No. 7 Long Beach State has the weekend off, but No. 9 South Carolina swept Jacksonville and North Florida.
To catch up on all of Saturday’s NCAA beach results and more news, go to collegebeachvb.com.
