Top-ranked Pepperdine beat visiting No. 4 Florida State 4-1 in NCAA beach volleyball on Wednesday, while in NCAA Division I-II men’s matches, No. 4 UCLA beat No. 14 Concordia in the MPSF and No. 11 Ball State won a five-set MIVA battle with No. 15 Fort Wayne.
Thursday’s men’s schedule shows five matches, two in the MPSF and three in the Big West.
In the MPSF, No. 2 BYU plays host to USC and Concordia gets no rest as the Eagles go to No. 7 Pepperdine.
The Big West slate starts with No. 1 Long Beach State, which plays host to No. 12 UC Santa Barbara. Third-ranked Hawai’i is at No. 10 CSUN and No. 5 UC Irvine is home for UC San Diego.
Waves roll: Pepperdine improved to 11-2 with its win over Florida State at Zuma Beach in Malibu. Florida State (9-4) travels south on Thursday and goes to No. 8 Long Beach State, where it also play No. 16 Loyola Marymount. TCU is also there and plays both LMU and Long Beach.
Pepperdine had to win in three at both the No. 1 and No. 3 slots, including Brook Bauer and Madalyn Roh beating FSU’s Sara Putt and Vanessa Freire at No. 1 21-14, 14-21, 15-13. FSU’s victory came at No. 5, where Madison Fitzpatrick and Eva Torreuella beat Jordan Ferrari and Katie Gavin.
Click here for the Pepperdine summary and results.
UCLA men sweep: The Bruins are 18-5 overall, 6-2 in the MPSF after their 25-22, 25-15, 25-19 victory.
Christian Hessenauer had 18 kills and hit .482 for UCLA. He had two of his team’s nine aces and nine digs. Jake Arnitz, who hit .381, and Dylan Missry had 10 kills each. Arnitz had an ace, six digs and a solo block, while Missry had two aces. Setter Micah Ma’a had four kills and no errors to hit 1.000, had two aces, five digs and a block.
Concordia (10-11, 3-4) was led by Raymond Barsemian’s eight kills.
Ball State survives: The Cardinals came away with a 21-25, 25-22, 21-25, 25-22, 15-10 win at Fort Wayne that left them 12-9, 5-2 in the MIVA, while the home team fell to 15-6, 3-4.
Ball State’s Matt Szews had 16 kills and two of his team’s eight aces. He added eight digs and two blocks. Matt Walsh had 11 kills and hit .476 to go with two digs and a match-high nine blocks, one solo. Mitch Weller added nine kills, an ace, seven digs and six blocks.
Fort Wayne’s Pelegrin Vargas had another big-time match, leading with 24 kills while hitting .326. He added an ace, a block and 15 digs. Colton Stone and Richie Diedrich, who hit .500, had 10 kills each. Stone added two aces, a block and six digs.
