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Tonight, the UCLA men’s volleyball team looks to get back on track after losing to UCSB and Long Beach State last week. The losses resulted in the team dropping from fourth in last week’s poll to sixth in this week’s poll. Tonight’s match against the Concordia Eagles should be just what the doctor ordered for the Bruins, especially after UCLA was swept by Long Beach State on Saturday.
Last Time Out
When UCLA travelled down the 405 to face the #1 Long Beach State 49ers on Saturday, it wasn’t pretty. In fact, it was downright ugly. That’s because the Bruins were swept by the 49ers for the second time this season. Long Beach State outhit UCLA in each of the three sets.
In the first set, the teams battled back and forth through the first sixteen points until they were tied 8-8. At that point, UCLA committed two very costly errors. First, there was a service error from Brandon Rattray and, then, on the next rally, Rattray committed an attack error. That gave Long Beach State a 10-8 lead, which the Bruins could just not come back from. Eventually, they dropped the first set, 25-20.
The second set played out much like the first, at least at the beginning. The teams battled again to start the set and were tied 7-7 after 14 points. At that point, a pair of consecutive points by the 49ers started a 6-2 run and that was enough as Long Beach State never relinquished the lead and won set #2 by a score of 25-17.
The third set, however, looked nothing like the first two except in the final result. Long Beach State jumped out to an early lead. First, it was 3-0. Then, it was 4-1. Soon, it was 8-2. It wasn’t until the 49ers were up by ten at 18-8 that UCLA finally managed to score on consecutive points in this set, but, by then, it was over. Despite a late comeback attempt, the Bruins would lose the set, 25-19, and the match, 3-0.
Concordia Eagles
In their second season as members of the MPSF for men’s volleyball, the Concordia Eagles are struggling. After finishing 16-15 overall and 5-7 in the MPSF last season, the Eagles are just 5-10 overall this season and 1-2 in the MPSF. The Eagles enter tonight having played eight matches against ranked opponents. Not only has Concordia lost all eight matches, they’ve only won two sets in those eight matches. They are currently on a two-match losing streak in which they were swept by both BYU and Stanford.
UCLA should be able to make it nine set losses in a row for the Eagles tonight.
This is your UCLA Bruins vs. Concordia Eagles men’s volleyball open thread.
Go Bruins!!!