NCAA: No. 2 Beach beats No. 6 UCI, Hildebrand on going to Nebraska

TJ DeFalco goes up to attack against UC Irvine's Matthew Younggren/Stephen Dachman photo

Greetings from Long Beach, Calif., where No. 2 Long Beach State overpowered No. 6 UC Irvine in the Pyramid on Wednesday night, pretty much turning the MPSF into a three-team race as we head into the final third of the regular season.

The Beach was by no means hitting on all cylinders, but coach Alan Knipe has an extremely athletic, powerful and balanced team and at 16-2 overall, 12-1 in the league, seemingly poised for a great run the rest of the way.

“Long Beach is playing like one of the best if not the best team in the country right now,” UCI coach David Kniffin said. “They’re tough to crack.”

There was one other MPSF match on Wednesday when No. 12 CSUN won in four over visiting UC San Diego.

Also in this roundup, a visit with longtime Beach guy Tyler Hildebrand, both a former player and longtime coach, who has taken the job as an assistant coach for Nebraska’s women’s program.

There were also two MIVA matches on Wednesday. But first, a look at Thursday’s schedule for the NCAA Division I-II men.

There is one match in the MPSF, when No. 14 USC (6-10, 5-8) plays the first of back-to-back matches at No. 4 Hawai’i (16-2, 7-2).

There are three MIVA matches on Thursday. Second-place Lewis (13-3, 7-2), the No. 5 team in the AVCA poll, goes to last-place Lindenwood. (1-13, 1-8) No. 9 Loyola (9-5, 5-2) goes to Quincy (3-12, 1-8), playing its first match with a new coach, and No. 11 Ball State (14-4, 6-3) plays host to Grand Canyon (9-8, 5-4), going for back-to-back wins over the Lopes.

The EIVA is off until Friday when its full slate includes UCSB at Penn State.

In Conference Carolinas, first-place King (14-2, 9-1) swept Lees-McRae (5-10, 3-7) on Wednesday and Thursday Emmanuel (4-12, 3-7) is at North Greenville (5-11, 5-5).

UCI’s Tamir Hershko reaches for a 50-50 ball against Long Beach State/Stephen Dachman photo

LBSU 3, UCI 1: Beach won 25-16, 25-22, 25-27, 25-15, dropping the Anteaters to 11-6, 8-5 after they hit .105. Last week’s national player of the week, senior Tamir Hershko, really struggled, with only six kills in 23 swings. He hit minus 0.43 and spent most of the third set — which UCI won — on the bench. For that matter, Thomas Hodges led the Anteaters, who saw a three-match win streak end, with just eight kills. Four others had six or more.

The Beach grinded and hit .295, but were led by the usual big guys. Kyle Ensing had 14 kills and hit .379, to go with eight digs and four blocks, TJ DeFalco had 12 kills and hit .290 and had three blocks, and three others had six kills each, including Bryce Yould, who hit .625.

“We’ve tried really hard to make sure we’re not becoming too dependent on one guy or the other. It’s really easy with TJ and Kyle to set them a million balls,” Knipe said. “It doesn’t make any difference what we do, they’re gonna get theirs. But we take a lot of pride in the fact that we’ve got a lot of guys who can kill the ball, we’ve got a good left-handed setter who can kill the ball, and all the guys playing the outside hitter spot can kill the ball.”

Speaking of that, setter Josh Tuaniga runs the show masterfully and he had 42 assists, three kills including a monster second-ball swing late in the fourth set, and five digs and two blocks.

“He creates a lot of stress for opponents,” Knipe said.

“Even when we’re playing really good volleyball it’s no better than a deuce-game win for us,” Kniffin said. “They never go away.”

“They’ve got a lot of volleyball saavy. They make plays that other teams don’t make and the plays that  are sloppy for other teams they make look clean. They’re just a volleyball level above what other teams are doing.”

Long Beach senior libero Andrew Sato, who had 10 digs, recognized that this was a big MPSF victory.

“They’ve been on a hot streak lately, pulling out some five-set wins and we knew we were going to have to bring it,” Sato said.

Speaking of hot streaks, Long Beach has won nine in a row, all in the MPSF, since losing in four at top-ranked Ohio State on January 28.

“We recognized areas to improve on after Ohio State and it’s just been getting significantly better every day at practice and every game,” Sato said.

That’s not lost on Knipe, who is obviously enjoying his team on and off the court.

“We’ve got a great group. Obviously they’re talented volleyball players, but absolutely one of the most enjoyable groups I’ve ever been around as far as their desire to get better and they’re commitment to this incredible team culture they’ve developed as a unit,” Knipe said.

Long Beach swept the Anteaters at Irvine on Feb. 10.

“To beat a good team twice is tough,” said Knipe, the 2012 U.S. Olympic coach. “Irvine is not easy and people might think so, but there are incredibly gifted teams in the MPSF and they’re all really, really well coached. So I’m really proud of the guys because tonight wasn’t necessarily the easiest match. We gutted it out and grinded it out more than it was pretty.”

Which might not have been a bad thing, he said.

“We’ve been on a nice roll for six weeks or so where things have been really comfortable and really smooth for most of our matches,” Knipe said. “Tonight it wasn’t like that and the response from our blocking defense and just the effort and winning long rallies was good. Getting the momentum back through your effort is a tough thing to do sometimes and our guys do that on a regular basis.”

Long Beach is home Friday for UC San Diego and then has a week off before George Mason of the EIVA and Loyola of the MIVA come to the Pyramid.

CSUN tops UCSD: The Matadors won 25-16, 22-25, 25-18, 25-21, and improved to 12-6 overall, 5-6 MPSF, while UCSD fell to 5-12, 2-10.

Arvis Greene led the winners with 21 kills and Dimitar Kalchev added 25 kills and had three aces and eight digs.

Tanner Syftestad had 16 kills, eight digs and three aces for UCSD. Shane Beamer had 11 kills, five blocks and an ace.

MIVA: Ball State, Fort Wayne win — The Cardinals rolled past Grand Canyon 25-21, 25-10, 25-21. Matt Szews had 12 kills and 11 digs and Matt Walsh had 12 blocks — three solo.

Fort Wayne lost a non-conference match at Lourdes in Ohio 25-18, 25-21, 20-25, 29-27 to drop to 5-15. Lourdes is 12-4.

Long Beach men’s/Nebraska women’s assistant Tyler Hildebrand

Hildebrand headed to Nebraska: The associate head coach is going to try pulling double duty, joining a program that challenges for the NCAA women’s title every year and eventually leaving one that certainly is in the hunt this men’s season.

“It was an incredibly tough decision,” Hildebrand said after the match Wednesday, “a very emotional decision, and ultimately we thought it was the right move for the family and we’re excited about the new challenge.”

Hildebrand, 33, is married to former Stanford standout and USA national-team player Kristin (Richards) Hildebrand and has been a women’s coach on the junior college and club levels.

According to the Nebraska news release from earlier this week announcing that Hildebrand had been hired, his wife “will be involved with the Husker program in a role to be determined later, similar to the role Chris and Jen Tamas served on the Husker staff as a husband-wife duo the past two years.”

Tyler Hildebrand was the Olympics beach coach for Jake Gibb and Casey Patterson last summer in Rio and was planning on being on staff for John Speraw and the USA men’s team for the next quad.

“It was really difficult to turn down the Tokyo Olympics, so it was just a tough decision,” he said “But we’re excited about the challenge.”

One of those challenges will be moving back and forth between programs the next three months, which he hopes to do.

“We’ve got to make sure that everything works out NCAA-wise, but I’m going to be able to be a volunteer here and fly in and out.”

He certainly wants to be a part of the Long Beach stretch run.

“That’s one of the things we discussed,” Hildebrand said. “Luckily Nebraska, John Cook and Long Beach were willing to make it work so I could finish this out. You know, I’ve had seven of these guys (through club and college) for eight years. It’s been a long time with these guys.”

It’s been a long time for him at the Beach, where he was a standout setter from 2003-06. He played on the national team from 2006-12. He’s been on staff at Long Beach since 2013. From 2008-10 he served as a volunteer assistant, a role that he’ll assume again.

And as far as coaching women?

“I don’t think there’s much of a difference. Personalities are going to be different, whether you’re teaching college or high school men’s and women’s, and I know there are going to be generalities that are different, but for our job, to get them to work and learn the game, it’s a similar deal.”

Earlier this offseason, Nebraska added Olympic libero Kayla Banwarth, a former Husker, to the staff. She replaced Dani Busboom Kelly, who took the job as head coach at Louisville. Hildebrand replaces Tamas, who is now the head coach at Illinois.

Hildebrand knows Banwarth well and said they visited quite a bit when he went to Lincoln last week.

“And (Nebraska head coach) John Cook has been great,” Hildebrand said. “I’m really looking forward to working with him. I’m very bummed about not being able to work with Speraw and Alan, but I’m excited about working with John Cook.”

Speaking of Cook, this is from the Nebraska news release earlier this week:

“Of all the coaches I’ve hired, Tyler is giving up more of what he has going on right now than anyone,” Cook said. “He’s got a Long Beach State men’s team that could win a national championship. He had a contract offer to be with the U.S. Men’s National Team that could be favored to win gold at the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo. And he’s also giving up his successful club program that he’s been a part of. So he’s giving up a lot to come to Nebraska. I know it was a difficult process for him to go through, but he and Kristin are really excited to come to Nebraska.”

“Impossible to overstate George Stepanof’s importance to beach volleyball”

George Stepanof awards the 1981 Ocean Beach Open trophies to Sinjin Smith and Karch Kiraly, with Queen JoAnn Janc presiding.

It’s hard to imagine beach volleyball in San Diego without California Beach Volleyball Association tournament director George Stepanof, who retired in December at 80.

Stepanof, who not only ran tournaments for more than half a century, created the rulebook and the ratings system that are still used today, and was one of the organizers of the Mexico Classic, at one time believed to be the largest volleyball tournament in the world.

George Stepanof announces the playoff pairings for the 2015 Mexico Classic/Ed Chan, VBshots.com

Stepanof wants to spend more time with Arlene, his wife of 60 years, who helped him take registrations at tournaments in the early years.

“Volleyball kind of gets under your skin,” Stepanof said. “You get so interested in it, you want to __play it.  It’s such a great sport to __play on the beach, you don’t usually get hurt on the beach. On that hard surface, you sometimes sprain ankles, and you bang up your knees, but on the sand, it’s great. It’s great exercise, and it keeps you healthy.”

Stepanof began playing in 1955 at a pickup game at the beach. Shortly thereafter, he assisted Bob Mann in his tournaments in San Diego’s Mission Beach, and soon began organizing tournaments at San Diego’s Ocean Beach. He served as chairman of the rules committee since the late 1960s.

In 1973, Jack Elliott started having a small draw tournament for friends, and invited Stepanof. Stepanof and founder Mike Brown grew the tournament into the Mexico Classic, a draw tournament where individuals are assigned partners by the tournament organizers. The tournament grew rapidly, and at its peak was believed to be the biggest tournament in the world at that time with 839 teams.

George Stepanof ran the 1983 Jose Cuervo Open in Ocean Beach, San Diego.

“It’s impossible to overstate George Stepanof’s importance to the CBVA and the sport of beach volleyball,” CBVA president Chris Brown said. “ He was one of the founding fathers of the CBVA, along with other titans of the game like Charlie Saikley, Gene Popko and Mike Cook.

“Among his litany of contributions to the sport, George literally wrote beach volleyball’s first rule book and was instrumental in creating the CBVA rating system (AAA, AA, etc.) which has been adopted by most other beach volleyball organizations.

“He has run tournaments in San Diego since the 1950s and has never missed a tournament. On a personal note, I feel very lucky to call George a mentor and friend. Our sport has benefited tremendously from his steady hand and he will be sorely missed.”

CBVA tournament director George Stepanof at his CBVA Hall of Fame induction ceremony in 1992.

Stepanof was also the chairman of the CBVA Hall of Fame, and was inducted in 1992 to recognize his lifetime of contributions.

“I love the guy, just a humble guy.” said Kevin Cleary, a former president of the AVP, CBVA tournament director, and member of the CBVA Board of Directors. “I can’t think of too many guys that have been around the volleyball scene as long as George has. He ran one of the very first open events ever, and everyone else that was running tournaments at that time has been gone for a while.

“He is our sounding board whenever we need a historical perspective on any rule or procedural changes. He is an invaluable source to the CBVA. We’re going to miss him.”

Stepanof, also a retired battalion chief for the fire department,  retired to make way for Steve Upp, who has been assisting Stepanof for more than 40 years. Stepanof once joked at a CBVA board meeting that Upp “has been helping me for over 40 years, a couple more and he’ll have it down pat.”

George Stepanof awards the 1984 San Diego Open trophies to Andrew Smith (right) and Dane Selznick (left).

Stepanof’s legacy lives on in two additional generations of players: his sons Scott, a AAA-rated player who earned MVP honors when he played in the high school county playoffs; Tom, who was awarded a volleyball scholarship at USIU; and Rick, who competed for Puerto Rico in FIVB competition. His 16-year-old granddaughter Camille was the team captain at Bishop HS, earned her AAA at 16, and is now a member of the Cal Berkeley beach team.

Stepanof said he will likely stay involved with the sport.

“I have grandsons playing now at Point Loma High,” he said. “I’ll probably watch them and Camille. I may still help Steve (Upp) occasionally and make trophies. Will probably still help with the Polar Bear tournament.”

Fun night for USC beach, Hawai’i men win, busy NCAA slate Friday

Current and former USC players gathered before playing on Friday night

LOS ANGELES — A tradition like no other. Well, at least in NCAA women’s volleyball.

After all, where else could you have pros April Ross and Geena Urango playing against the best college pair in history, Kelly Claes and Sara Hughes?

For the record, Ross and Urango won in three, 15-13 in the third, but it was a battle.

“They’re the future,” Urango said.

The beach season starts in reality Friday with a number of tournaments around the nation, but defending-champion USC got things going Thursday with its Cardinal & Gold Alumni Challenge at its Merle Norman Stadium. It started with a pre-party involving fans, boosters and beach alums, and continued with today’s USC players squaring off against the Women of Troy who came before them. Not that long before them, of course, because this is only the sixth year of the USC program.

While the women finally get sandy, the NCAA men’s season continues with a busy slate Friday after a few results from Thursday. So we’ll start with the men.

Stijn van Tilburg of Hawai’l attacks against USC’s Lucas Lossone, left, and Andy Benesh/Hawai’i photo

MPSF: No. 4 Hawai’i beat visiting No. 14 USC on Thursday 25-20, 25-23, 25-23. The Rainbow Warriors ( 17-2 overall, 8-2 MSPF) __play the Trojans (6-11, 5-9) again Friday.

There’s quite a bit of non-conference action ahead, as No. 8 Stanford goes to No. 15 Penn State to __play Lees-McRae of Conference Carolinas and No. 13 UCSB plays Penn State of the EIVA. In the league, UC San Diego goes to No. 2 Long Beach State, No. 6 UC Irvine goes to CSUN and Cal Baptist plays at No. 3 BYU.

Hawai’i’s victory was its 12 in a row as it won its 23rd consecutive set. Sophomore opposite Stijn van Tilburg had 17 kills and hit .333. Brett Rosenmeier and Kupono Fey had 10 kills each. Lucas Yoder led USC with 11 kills.

MIVA: There were three matches Thursday, as No. 5 Lewis beat Lindenwood in four, No. 9 Loyola did the same to Quincy and Grand Canyon upset No. 11 Ball State in five. Friday night, top-ranked and undefeated Ohio State plays host to Saint Francis of the EIVA and McKendree goes to the EIVA’s George Mason.

Second-place Lewis improved to 14-3, 8-2 while dropping last-place Lindenwood to 1-14, 1-9, with its 25-21, 24-26, 25-16, 25-23 victory. Trevor Weiskircher had 12 kills and two blocks and Matt Yoshimoto and Tom Beckmann had eight kills each.

Third-place Loyola improved to 10-5, 6-2 and dropped Quincy, tied with Lindenwood for last, to 3-13, 1-9, with its 25-21, 25-16, 21-25, 25-15 victory. Cole Murray had a career-high 12 kills and Ben Plaisted added 10. Anthony Winter had 12 for the home team and David Siebum had 10, but also 10 errors.

Grand Canyon has been knocking on the door lately, taking Ohio State to five last weekend, and finally broke through with its 20-25, 25-21, 25-23, 20-25, 16-14 road victory. It left the Lopes 9-9, 5-4, and Ball State 14-4, 6-3, as the Cardinals saw a three-match winning streak end a day after sweeping Grand Canyon.

Matthew Kinnebrew led GCU with 13 kills and had six blocks and 10 digs while hitting .077. Shaley Saada added 12 kills and five blocks, two solo, and seven digs.

They offset a big effort by Ball State’s Matt Szews, who had a career-high 23 kills in 51 swings and hit .333. He also had five blocks and nine digs and two of his team’s four aces and five of its 21 service errors. Brendan Surane added 13 kills.

EIVA: There are five on tap, including the aforementioned Penn State, Saint Francis and Mason matches. Inside the league, Harvard goes to Saint Francis and Charleston plays at Princeton.

Conference Carolinas: There was one match Thursday as North Greenville swept Emmanuel. Friday, in addition to the aforementioned Lees-McRae match with Stanford, there are two league matches at Pfeiffer goes to Barton and Belmont Abbey plays at Mount Olive. Emmanuel goes out of conference to play Lincoln Memorial

NCAA beach begins: Most teams get going this Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

Among them, on Zuma Beach, just north of Pepperdine, the No. 4 Waves play host to USC and No. 3 UCLA. on Saturday.

USC’s Claes is pretty excited to get things going. Her team not only won the last two national championships, the AVCA in 2015 and the first NCAA title in 2016, but is ranked No. 1, and she and Hughes are riding a 73-match winning streak.

“It feels like forever. Our offseason is so long,” Claes said. “It’s finally here and I’m stoked.”

In Tuscon, No. 6 Arizona is home for Jacksonville and No. 5 Hawai’i on Friday and then Arizona State on Saturday.

Alabama-Birmingham (UAB) plays host to Jacksonville State, Mercer, New Orleans, Louisiana-Monroe, Tulane and Austin Peay.

Florida State and LSU are at Stetson.

Long Beach State has Cal Bakersfield and Irvine Valley. Stanford is home for Saint Mary’s, Pacific, Cal Poly, Portland and Oregon And Georgia State is at St. Augustine, Fla., meeting UNCW, College of Charleston and Spring Hill.

Big fun on Figueroa: USC coach Anna Collier was having a blast on Friday.“I really enjoy this event, especially with all the alumni playing,” Collier said. “And they’re good volleyball players and it’s great volleyball and a lot of fun. I think it’s good for our players to connect to their history. Not everyone gets to do this.”

That wasn’t lost on Urango, the pro beach player who played on the first USC beach team in 2012. She finished her indoor career the previous fall and then got her masters’s degree.

“You never really know or understand what the USC alumni system is all about until you graduate,” Urango said. “You graduate and come back and it’s like you never left. It’s a family and everybody knows everybody. It’s a great environment to come back to. It’s warm and fun and makes me miss it.”

Ross, a four-time indoors All-American who left USC long before it got a beach program, worked hard but played with a smile.

“It’s fun. I want to be involved in USC tradition and half the reason I came to USC was because of the alumni network and to come to events like this is a huge part of having gone to school here,” Ross said.

“It’s also really cool because the team is so good. Honestly, it’s good training for me.”

Playing Claes and Hughes, 48-0 last year, was special, she said.

“They’re very, very good,” Ross said. “I’m not going to say I came in expecting to win that. I want to help them get better, too, and I want to see them win a national championship this year. So I want to be part of that.”

Don’t think that Claes and Hughes didn’t appreciate it.

“It was fun. It’s fun and challenging to play against an Olympian,” Claes said.

“The opportunity to play April Ross and Geena Urango any day makes us so much better,” Hughes said. “I’m so thankful they came out here and they competed so hard against us. We really appreciate it.

Other alums who competed included Tracy Lindquist, Jeanne Vetter, Falyn Fonoimoana, Alexa Strange, Kashi Cormier, Cinnamon Sary, Katie Haller, Antoinette Polk and Emily Young.It was a good way to warm up for the season opener.

“Exactly, because we get our jitters out here and then we’re going to play great, hopefully, against UCLA and Pepperdine this weekend.”

April Ross update: She and partner Kerri Walsh Jennings, of course, won the bronze medal at the Rio Olympics. They opened the season at the FIVB event last month in Fort Lauderdale, where they lost in the quarterfinals. That was a very early start to the season, followed by a huge break until competition starts again in May.

“It’s really hard,” she admitted. “I don’t like having an event like that super early in the year and we trained hard but it was short. So I didn’t feel super sharp and I was super motivated afterwards because we lost a really tight one we should have won.

“Then to come back and have all this off time, it’s really hard to capitalize on that motivation. We still have a long time till our next event.”

She laughed.

“I’m doing a lot of fun things, still, like playing in indoors open gyms and snowboarding and stuff,” she said. “Which probably isn’t best for my body, but I have all this free time and I want to have fun and it’s cross-training, too. But it’s not like 100-percent go yet.”

While they don’t play together often, Ross and Urango are close friends and even vacationed together this winter in Europe.

Urango and partner Angela Bensend, nicknamed Team TexMex, are preparing for their third season together on the AVP tour.

Sinjin Smith: Make the men’s volleyball slower

Sinjin Smith is best known as a beach-volleyball legend, but he was also a two time national champion and All-American indoors at UCLA. His son, Hagen, is currently a senior at UCLA. So he’s pretty well-versed on today’s men’s game as well. Coinciding with our story on volleyballs, we had spoken with Smith about just that — volleyballs. Here’s his take:

“I’ve been working on this one for a long time. It’s the ball itself.

“Everyone wants to change the game and make the game better. The athletes are bigger and stronger and the ball travels really fast. In the men’s case, it’s so fast you can’t react. That’s why in the women’s game you have rallies. The ball isn’t traveling as fast.

“So if you wanted to actually make the game more interesting to the public and see more rallies, slow the ball down.

“On the beach it’s a softer ball already. The ball doesn’t travel as fast and you’re able to cover everything. If the men played with a ball indoors that was as soft as the beach ball, it would slow down, there would be more digs, the ball would stay in __play more and it would be a more interesting game to watch.”

Smith said there are a lot of different ways to make it happen.

“There’s the bladder, there’s the cover, there’s the inflation — how many pounds of pressure — the technology is there to do what you want with the frickin’ ball these days.”

Brady-gate coming to volleyball?

“And the size of the ball, too. Make it bigger. Just a couple of centimeters, change the circumference. Particularly for the men.”

NCAA: UCI edges UCLA, Lewis, Ohio State win, Penn hires women’s coach

UCSB's Jacob Delson attacks against UCSD's Tanner Syftestad/Ed Chan, VBshots.com

Friday was upset-free in NCAA men’s volleyball, unless you consider No. 7 UC Irvine beating No. 6 UCLA an upset.

Otherwise, the teams with the better records won every match in the four Division I-II conferences, where there’s a breakaway in the MPSF and Princeton stayed alone in first in the MIVA.

And Penn of the Ivy League finally has a new women’s coach, Katie Schumacher-Cawley.

But first Saturday’s NCAA men’s schedule.

Start in the MPSF, where No. 13 UC Santa Barbara goes to UC Irvine and UCLA tries to bounce back at UC San Diego.

The MIVA has three matches, including No. 5 Lewis — which beat crosstown rival No. 9 Loyola on Friday — going out of conference against Mount Olive of the Conference Carolinas.

Also, Fort Wayne goes to Lindenwood and No. 12 Ball State goes to Quincy.

The EIVA, which has three teams one game or less chasing Princeton in the standings, has No. 15 Penn State at Charleston, Princeton at Sacred Heart — and if Sacred Heart wins they would be tied for the lead — Saint Francis at George Mason and NJIT at Harvard.

ConfCarolinas has King at Limestone, North Greenville at Lees-McRae and Pfeiffer at Erskine. Emmanuel goes out of conference at Lincoln Memorial.

UCI’s Tamir Hershko scores a season-high 23 kills in a five-set win over visiting UCLA/UCI athletics

MPSF: UCI, UCSB among the winners

We start in Irvine, Calif., where the Anteaters almost let a 2-0 lead slip away, but held on to down visiting UCLA 25-23, 28-26, 22-25, 21-25, 17-15 in front of 2,253 fans at the Bren Center.

UC Irvine moves to 5-0 in five-set matches and 10-5 overall (7-4 MPSF). UCLA dropped to 10-7 and 7-6 in conference play.

Senior Tamir Hershko had a season-high 23 kills to lead Irvine. Thomas Hodges added 18 kills, wihle Aaron Koubi had a career-best 11 kills, 10 digs and two aces. Senior Michael Saeta had 52 assists, eight digs, four kills and one ace, while freshman Scott Stadick, a Wisconsin native, had seven kills and three total blocks.

Christian Hessenauer’s 16 kills paced UCLA. Jake Arnitz had 13 kills, while Dylan Missry had 11 kills. Micah Ma’a had 42 assists, four kills and three block assists. UCLA held a 12.5-4.0 blocking advantage.

Irvine’s match against UCLA was its annual Think Pink breast cancer awareness night. The team honored Tee Sohacki, a two-time breast cancer survivor, before the event.

UCSB’s Corey Chavers takes on the UCSD triple block/Ed Chan, VBshots.com

VolleyballMag.com’s Ed Chan was at UCSB’s 25-19, 25-20, 25-14 MPSF win over UC San Diego at RIMAC Arena.

Senior outside hitter Jacob Delson led the Gauchos with 11 kills and 12 digs. It was his third double-double of the season and fifth of his career. Delson’s efforts helped Santa Barbara snap a seven-match losing streak after the squad had started the season 6-1.

“It felt great to finally beat the losing streak,” Delson told VBM’s Chan after the match. “We broke it tonight and I hope it carries into tomorrow (against Irvine). We talked about this in film. If we just keep the pressure on them, they are more prone to make errors because we have a pretty good block. We showed that tonight, we’re getting great touches.”

Freshman middle blocker Keenan Sanders had nine kills on 13 swings. Connor Drake had seven kills, hit .429 and had seven total blocks. Santa Barbara had four players score 10 or more points in the contest.  Hayden Boehle added five kills and seven digs. Parker Boehle had nine digs. Casey McGarry finished with 34 assists.

Santa Barbara, which had five service aces against 11 service errors, improved to 7-8 overall and 4-8 in league play.

“Tonight we had one of our better serving matches of the year,” Santa Barbara coach Rick McLaughlin said. “Our biggest thing is serving real tough and keeping them off the net a bit. We’ve been working on that a lot and hope we can do it again (tonight against Irvine).”

Tanner Syftestad had 10 kills for UC San Diego, which fell to 5-10, 2-8. Ian Colbert added four kills, while Milosh Stojcic had 20 assists.

No. 2 Long Beach State dispatched No. 14 USC 25-17, 25-12, 25-15 at the Walter Pyramid to improve to 15-2 and remain in first place in the MPSF at 11-1.

Long Beach State, which moved to 6-0 at home and 8-0 in February, hit .524, never slipping below .400 in any of the three sets. The 49ers had 38 kills on only 63 attempts, while committing just five hitting errors.

“I’m just glad they came out with a significantly better sense of competitiveness and sense of urgency to __play every point here tonight,” Long Beach State coach Alan Knipe said. “There is no doubt a lot of the little things went our way tonight, unlike the beginning of our match Wednesday night (a four-set win over Cal Baptist) where a lot of little things didn’t go our way in the first set.

“The lesson learned for us is to keep pressuring and good things usually happen. I like the response by the guys to come out and be ready to go right out of the gate for whatever they are going to bring at us.”

Sophomore setter Josh Tuaniga had 33 assists and two kills, two aces, five blocks and four digs. TJ DeFalco led Long Beach State with 14 kills and hit .550. It was his 15th double-figure kill contest of the season. Kyle Ensing added nine kills on 16 swings with no errors, hitting .562. The 49ers took advantage of 11 USC service errors, four blocking errors and six reception errors.

USC fell to 6-10, 5-8. Lucas Lossone and Ryan Moss led the Trojans with five kills each. Gert Lisha had 21 assists, while Lossone and Blake Markland each had three digs.

No. 3 BYU completed a sweep at Stanford, this time notching a 25-19, 23-25, 25-23, 26-24 victory over the No. 8 Cardinal at Burnham Pavilion & Ford Center.

“I’m proud of the way the guys played tonight,” BYU coach Shawn Olmstead said. “We knew Stanford wasn’t about to throw in the towel after that first set. They are a really good, disciplined team. We had a great couple wins this week that helped us get better as a team.”

Jake Langlois led the Cougars with 14 kills and 12 digs, while also registering a team-high eight blocks. Erik Sikes had a career-high 15 digs and Leo Durkin had 45 assists. Price Jarman had a career-high 10 kills while adding a season-high eight blocks. Tim Dobbert and Joseph Grosh each added seven blocks to help BYU move to 14-2, 8-1.

The Cougars remain tied with Long Beach State in the loss column atop the MPSF, however Long Beach State has three more league wins.

BYU registered 18.5 total team blocks (all block assists), while Stanford had 11.

Stanford dropped to 9-7 overall and 6-5 in conference play. Gabriel Vega led the Cardinal with 14 kills, while Jordan Ewert had 10 kills. Kevin Rakestraw finished with eight kills and Clay Jones had seven kills. Paul Bischoff had 35 assists. Evan Enriques had 13 digs, while Bischoff had 10 digs. Stanford hit .165 in the match.

At the Stan Sheriff Center, No. 4 Hawai’i downed visiting No. 10 Pepperdine 25-21, 25-19, 25-11. The 25-11 third-set win for Hawai’i was the largest margin of victory ever in the all-time series with Pepperdine.

Hawai’i is 15-2, 6-2. Pepperdine is 6-6, 4-5. The two teams __play again Sunday.

Hawai’i extended its winning streak to 10 matches and its set streak to 17. The Rainbow Warriors won for the 14th time in a row at home and 10th this season.

Sophomore right-side hitter Stijn van Tilburg had 15 kills and hit .737i. Senior outside Kupono Fey had 10 kills and hit .500. Hawaii hit .460 in the match.

Mitchell Penning’s 11 kills led Pepperdine.

In other MPSF action, No. 11 Cal State Northridge was a 25-21, 25-20, 25-22 winner over Cal Baptist. CSUN is 11-6, 4-6, while Cal Baptist is 3-13, 1-11.

MIVA: No. 1 Buckeyes, Lewis keep rolling

No. 1 Ohio State was a 25-19, 17-25, 26-24, 25-23 winner over Grand Canyon University in Phoenix. The Buckeyes improved to 16-0 and have the longest winning streak in The Ohio State University athletics history for teams competing in head-to-head competition, 39 in a row. Ohio State has won 117 of 140 sets (84 percent) during that stretch. The win against Grand Canyon was Ohio State’s 17th in a row in a true road-match environment.

The Buckeyes need eight more wins to tie the 1979-1980 and 1983-1985 UCLA teams for most wins in a row in NCAA men’s volleyball history. Ohio State also is looking to record just sixth 40-match winning streak in NCAA Division I-II men’s volleyball history.

Ohio State overcame 29 service errors. Ohio State remains atop the MIVA standings at 7-0 ahead of Lewis (7-2), Grand Canyon (5-2) and Loyola (5-2).

Maxime Hervoir, who entered the match in the second set, had 11 kills on 15 attempts with one error, hitting .667. He added three block assists and scored 13.5 points.

Miles Johnson had 20.5 points, which included 17 kills, four blocks and an ace. Christy Blough had 46 assists and quarterbacked the Buckeyes to a .354 team hitting percentage. He also had nine digs. Driss Guessous and Blake Leeson combined for 19 kills.

In Chicago, visiting Lewis outlasted area rival Loyola 19-25, 25-19, 22-25, 25-15, 15-11 at Gentile Arena.

Lewis won its sixth five-setter of the year (most during coach Dan Friend’s tenure) and it also was the Flyers’ fourth straight win after losing the first set in a match.

Mitch Perinar led the Flyers with a match-high 15 kills, while Ryan Coenen had 13 kills and hit .417. Lewis moves to 12-3 overal, 7-2 MIVA. Sophomore setter Matt Yoshimoto had 42 assists and eight digs.

Loyola drops to 9-5, 5-2.

In other MIVA play, Fort Wayne traveled to Quincy and notched a 24-26, 25-19, 26-24, 20-25, 16-14 win at the Pepsi Arena.

Pelegrin Vargas led Fort Wayne with 22 kills and hit .341. He also had 10 digs to notch his first career double-double. Michael Keegan had 43 assists and 10 digs for his third double-double of the year. He also had a career-high six kills. Alex Dickmann had 10 digs and seven kills. Fort Wayne moves to 5-13, 2-5, while Quincy drops to 3-11, 1-7.

No. 12 Ball State was a 3-1 winner over Lindenwood in St. Charles, Mo. Brendan Surane, Matt Walsh and Matt Szews each had 10 kills. Walsh hit .562 and also had six block assists and one solo block. Freshman Nick Lavanchy had nine digs. Setter Connor Gross recorded 37 assists, seven digs and four block assists. Ball State moves to 12-4, 4-3.

EIVA: Princeton, Penn State notch victories

Princeton moved into sole possession of first place in the conference with a 25-20, 25-20, 20-25, 17-25, 15-10 win at Harvard. It was Princeton’s first win at Harvard since 2010.

Princeton moves to 6-6 overall and 4-1 in EIVA action. The Princeton win coupled with New Jersey Institute of Technology’s win over Sacred Heart, leaves the Tigers as the only one-loss team in conference play.

Parker Dixon, the current AVCA national player of the week, led the Tigers with 18 kills. Junior Oboh had 15 kills on 29 swings (.448 hitting), while George Huhmann had 12 kills on 21 swings (.476 hitting). Huhmann added seven blocks.

Casey White had 16 kills to lead the Crimson (4-6, 2-3).

No. 15 Penn State ran its record to 10-6 overall and 5-2 in EIVA play with a 25-21, 17-25, 25-16, 25-17 win over George Mason (5-8, 2-4).

Aiden Albrecht led the Nittany Lions with 18 kills on 25 attempts (.520 hitting). He also had four digs. Jalen Penrose added 14 kills and hit a match-high .714. Luke Braswell had 41 assists, while Lee Smith had six digs. Penn State hit more than .600 over the final two sets and hit .376 in the match.

Langston Payne’s nine kills paced George Mason.

In Technology’s win at Sacred Heart, Jabarry Goodridge led with 21 kills on 48 swings (.333 hitting). Luke Robbe had seven kills and hit .462, while Raymond Kowalski had nine kills and hit .273. The Highlanders (7-6, 3-2 EIVA) hit .300 in the match.

Christopher DeLucie had 13 kills, while Michael Comens added 12 kills for Sacred Heart, which falls to 10-3 overall and 3-2 in conference play.

Saint Francis headed to Charleston W. Va. And scored a 3-1 win over Charleston. Brandon Buck’s 10 kills led Saint Francis. Daniel Ford had 10 digs and four blocks. Ryan Santos and Byron Hurd each had 10 kills for Charleston, while Donovan Wilmott had eight kills and hit .500 (one error on 14 swings).

A light night of action in Conference Carolinas saw Barton record a 3-0 win over Coker and Emmanuel (Ga.) sweep Pfeiffer.

Vasilis Mandilaris and Angelos Mandilaris each had 11 kills for Barton, while Angelos Mandilaris added 11 digs. Gabriel Castro had nine kills for Coker. Gary Baker added eight digs.

Aleksa Lakic’s 13 kills paced Emmanuel, while Caleb Bonaventure had 43 assists. Lakic also had 11 digs for a double-double.

Penn fills women’s vacancy

Schumacher-Cawley comes to Penn after 14 years at the University of Illinois-Chicago (UIC), including the last eight as head coach. She had 113 wins at UIC, third on the program’s all-time list, and oversaw UIC’s first Horizon League title in seven years when the Flames won it in 2012.

Schumacher-Cawley played at Mother McAuley High School in Chicago and is a member of the Chicagoland Sports Hall of Fame. She played collegiately at Penn State, where she was a two-time All-American. She was on Penn State’s 1999 NCAA-championship team.

She replaced Kerry Major Carr, who resigned after 19 years. Penn was 10-16 in 2016, 5-9 in the Ivy League.

VBM Supplier Spotlight: The 2017 indoor and outdoor volleyballs

VolleyballMag.com continues its long-standing tradition of bringing you the latest in volleyball-related equipment, gear and apparel. We kick off our new-and-improved Supplier Spotlight section with a look at the latest in indoor and outdoor volleyballs. Please visit the supplier websites for further information.

Indoors

Molten setter’s volleyball
The Molten setter training volleyball (model V5M9000-M) is designed for the athlete committed to reaching a higher level of competition. At 14.1 ounces, the V5M9000-M promotes strength and quickness to bring out each setter’s peak performance on the court, Molten notes. Slightly lighter than a typical setter’s ball, it is intended to be used in game-like situations and drills and is ideal for high-repetition setting practice. The unique panel shape, modeled after Molten’s elite FLISTATEC volleyballs, dramatically increases the ball’s visibility in flight, the company adds. Features a micro-fiber composite cover and is nylon-wound.
www.moltenusa.com

Wilson i-Cor HP volleyball
Wilson’s i-Cor high-performance volleyball offers the ultimate combination of control durability and power, the company states. Covered in Japanese full-grain leather and built with latex power lining and proprietary i-Cor construction, the ball provides a premium touch and feel on every shot, Wilson adds. The i-Cor has an inner structural layer that provides a strong foundation to the ball, while the outer structural layer allows for better control and durability.
www.wilson.com

Baden Perfection leather volleyball
The Baden Perfection leather volleyball is a top-of-the-line volleyball for all aspects of the game and for all levels of play, the company notes. Baden’s innovative tanning process softens the feel of its leather to battle the sting on touch blocks or digs. The blended cotton wrap ensures shape and air retention for reinforced strength and durability. A butyl bladder provides the optimal weight for velocity and performance hit after hit. Baden adds.
www.badensports.com

Mikasa MVA200
The new Mikasa MVA200 indoor volleyball has a unique 8-panel design and aerodynamic dimpling that offers better stability and ball control, the company notes. With Mikasa’s exclusive Micro-Fibre cover, the touch and feel of this ball has brought praise from players and coaches worldwide and has become the indoor ball of choice for all nations,” Mikasa says. The MVA200 is the official FIVB game ball.
www.mikasasports.com

Tachikara 5W-PRIME
Tachikara’s 5W-PRIME elite competition volleyball is the company’s latest innovation in Tactile Technology. Featuring a new T-TEC Micro-Leather that is specifically engineered to provide an enhanced tactile playing experience with increased ball control, Tachikara notes. The ball is NFS approved and ships inflated and ready for play.
www.tachikara.com

Outdoors/All-Around

Spalding/KOB tour and replica balls
Partners Spalding and King of the Beach and Queen of the Beach recently released their official 2017 tour balls and replica ball of the 2017 Spalding King of the Beach and Queen of the Beach Tour. The premium composite leather construction on the tour ball is unmatched and is a favorite ball of players on tour, the companies note. The re-design includes a gold foil for the King of the Beach logo, and the white Queen of the Beach logo ball allows players to color in their favorite design. The balls are available nationwide at select sporting goods retailers including Sports Authority, Target, Walmart, Big Five, Dicks Sporting Goods, Academy Sports, Dunhams, Hibbets, VolleyballUSA.com and Kohls.com, as well as on the websites www.kingofthebeach.com and www.spalding.com. KOB, which features brand ambassadors Karch Kiraly and Sinjin Smith, has more than 1,500 tournaments scheduled nationwide in 2017 with 52 tour locations.
www.spalding.com
www.kingofthebeach.com

Mikasa VLS300
The Mikasa VLS300 is the outdoor ball used by all national teams as well as in all FIVB competitions worldwide, including the past 2012 London Olympics, the recent 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics and the upcoming 2020 Tokyo Olympics. The VLS300 model features a unique 10-panel design and the blue/yellow/white curved-panel design enables players to pick up on the movement or rotation of the ball with ease, while improving control when passing or hitting. The cover material is a “Super Composite,” which is high-grade supple material that is extremely durable yet flexible and resistant to water, which is extremely important when playing in inclement or humid conditions, Mikasa explains. The VLS300 is made from patented lock-stich construction that enables the ball to maintain its true spherical shape.
www.mikasausa.com

New AVP game volleyball
The new Wilson AVP volleyball is a collaborative effort where player feedback directed the design of the ball. The ball offers premium graphics for better spin detection, as well as a microfiber composite leather cover that provides superior touch, Wilson states. The pebbled TPE cover allows for enhanced durability and control during play. The 18-panel machine-sewn construction reinforces optimal shape retention. Made with a butyl rubber bladder for extended air retention.
www.wilson.com

Molten Light Touch volleyball
USA Volleyball approved, Molten’s Light Touch volleyball is a lightweight indoor/outdoor volleyball designed for athletes ages 12 and under. The ultra-soft-cushioned polyurethane cover provides a soft touch, allowing young athletes to __play comfortably while providing the durability needed to withstand __play in any environment. The ball is machine stitched.
www.moltenusa.com

 

Baden Sandshark sand volleyball
The Baden Sandshark is a premier sand volleyball used by the USC beach volleyball team. The hand-sewn microfiber cover endures the elements of outdoor sun, sand and sweat. The butyl bladder provides the optimal weight for velocity and performance hit after hit, Baden notes.
www.badensports.com

Tachikara PARTY SofTec volleyball
The new Tachikara SofTec PARTY volleyball is made with a soft foam-back composite for virtually no sting during play, the company notes. The fun starburst patterns and colors make it a great all-around volleyball for all levels.
www.tachikara.com

BYU, Erskine win, big Friday ahead in NCAA men’s volleyball

There were just two matches in NCAA men’s volleyball among the four Division I-II leagues Thursday, as No. 4 BYU swept No. 8 Stanford and Erskine did the same to Belmont Abbey.

But Friday’s schedule is loaded, especially in the MPSF, in what has become a top-heavy league, BYU (13-2, 7-1) gets Stanford (9-9, 6-4) again, first-place and No. 2 Long Beach State (14-2 overall, 10-1 MPSF) gets suddenly hot No. 14 USC (6-9, 5-7), and No. 6 UCLA (10-6, 7-5) goes to No. 7 UC Irvine (9-5, 6-4).

No. 10 Pepperdine begins its two-match trip to No. 4 Hawai’i (14-2, 5-2).

No. 13 UCSB (6-8, 3-4) plays at UC San Diego (5-9, 2-7) and last-place Cal Baptist (3-12, 1-10) goes to No.11 CSUN (10-6, 3-6)

In the MIVA, top-ranked Ohio State plays (15-0, 6-0) plays host to Grand Canyon (9-5, 5-1) in a big chance for the Lopes to keep pace and make a statement, and there’s a lot on the line in Chicago when No. 5 Lewis (11-3, 6-2) goes to No. 9 Loyola (9-4, 5-1), with the loser no doubt falling two games back of Ohio State. No. 12 Ball State (11-4, 3-3) entertains lowly Lindenwood (0-12, 0-7) and Fort Wayne (4-13, 2-4) goes to Quincy (3-10, 1-6).

Entering the season you might have bookmarked Friday’s EIVA match between No. 15 Penn State (9-6, 4-2) at George Mason (5-7, 2-3) as one of the biggest of the season, but now the loser could be fighting for survival. Also, Princeton (5-6, 3-1), tied for first with Sacred Heart, plays at Harvard (4-5, 2-2) and NJIT (6-6, 2-4) is at Sacred Heart (10-2, 3-1). Also, Saint Francis  (6-9, 2-4) goes to Charleston (7-6, 0-3).

There are two matches in Conference Carolinas, when last-place Pfeiffer (0-6, 0-6) goes to Emmanuel (3-10, 2-6) and Barton (9-4) goes out of the league to entertain Coker.

BYU overpowers Stanford: The Cougars won 25-21, 25-20, 25-21.

Jake Langlois led the Cougars with 14 kills and hit .375 to go with five digs. He also had an ace and three of hits team’s 17 service errors. Tim Dobbert had nine kills, eight digs and four blocks. Brenden Sander had 10 kills and hit .438, four digs and three blocks, and four of those service errors. BYU had five aces.

“Tonight was a great team performance,” BYU coach Shawn Olmstead said. “As a team, we’ve been working each day in practice to improve on a few things, and I thought we made progress there.”

Gabriel Vega led Stanford with 10 kills and Eric Beatty added eight.

Erskine sweeps Belmont Abbey: Erskine improved to 2-10, 2-6 in Conference Carolinas with its 25-22, 25-22, 25-18 win. It left Belmont Abbey 3-9, 2-6. Isaac Lanier had 17 kills and hit .406 for the winners and added eight digs.

There were no matches Thursday in the MIVA or EIVA.