A straight-down kill by middle attacker Josh Aruya for a 22-21 lead got the Thunderdome crowd roaring in the first set of UC Santa Barbara’s men’s volleyball match against No. 1 Long Beach State on Thursday night.
The thrill of that play didn’t last long for the Gauchos as the Beach came right back with a straight-down bomb of its own from 6-foot-11 middle Ben Braun, igniting a three-point run that led to a 25-23 steal of the set.
The Gauchos found themselves playing catch-up the rest of the night in the Big West match and lost in four sets before a season-best crowd of 2,243. The set scores were 25-23, 25-16, 19-25, 25-19.
Long Beach improves to 22-1 on the season and 4-1 in the Big West while UCSB falls to 11-11 and 2-3.
“We knew we had to come out strong,” said UCSB junior outside hitter Ben Coordt. “They were a tough team. We had to get after them from the service line. Maybe in our own atmosphere, we hope they come out a little flat and we just really bring our own energy and feed off the fans in here.”
With the rabid support of a group of students in the south end zone seats, the Gauchos went toe-to-toe with the top-ranked 49ers and their two talented Bulgarian freshman stars, 6-8 setter Moni Nikolov (43 assists, 5 kills, 2 service aces, 2 block assists) and 6-7 outside hitter Alex Kandev (13 kills on a .385 hitting average, 3 block assists). Any time the Bulgarian players were stopped, the student group chanted U-S-A, U-S-A…!
But the Beach stars got in the last word in the opening set. After a mistimed back-row attack by UCSB, Nikolov fed Kandev for a kill to break a 22-22 tie. On the next play, a low serve reception led to a tight set and Kandev and middle DiAeris McRaven smothered the Gaucho attack.
UCSB won a coach’s challenge to make it 24-23, but the Gauchos committed a service error on the next play to end the set.
“(Long Beach) came out a little flat, and we used that to our advantage,” said Coordt. “Just towards the end of that set, it slipped away. There’s a couple points that we wish we had back. It’s a game of inches, and we almost had them.”
The Beach carried momentum into the second set and produced big scoring runs to open up a sizable lead. At 4-3, a combination block by Kandev and McRaven started a 4-0 run for an 8-3 advantage. The lead got as big as 23-10.
Coordt said the height advantage of Long Beach made it a challenge to play against.
Besides Nikolov and Kandev, there’s 6-11 Ben Braun (11 kills), 6-9 Danil Hershtynovich (11 kills) and 6-7 Skylar Varga (8 kills) pounding balls for the Beach, which posted a team hitting percentage of .412 and had 19 blocks. UCSB hit .219 and finished with eight total blocks.
“Man, they’re a tall team,” said Coordt. “Obviously, they’re setter is world class, but, you know, standing next to them, they got a lot of tall guys. Every single one of them is 6-6 or 6-7. They got height, so they get away with a lot of stuff. I don’t say mismatches, but we don’t have much room for error. When we’re a little undersized, we got to be that much more precise and perfect.”
UCSB regrouped in the third set and took it to the taller 49ers. Riggs Guy, a 6-3 outside hitter, got hot and scored four straight points, including a kill from the back row, to give the Gauchos a 14-7 lead.
The Beach cut the deficit to three (16-13), but UCSB responded with a kill from Owen Berg in the middle and a jump ace from Coordt. Guy continued his strong play with a solo block and a kill, helping extend the lead to 23-17. They scored the last two points on Beach service errors.
“We came back in the third,” said Coordt. “We just knew we were playing good ball. Besides a couple specific runs of long points, where they kind of looked like they’re in control, it felt like we were playing good volleyball and playing with them for the majority of the match.We just tried to reset and just take it five points at a time and really talk about each rotation and break it down. It felt good to get that third-set victory, because we just completed what we’ve been working on, and we know we can do it.
“So, it’s all about kind of taking that and improving on it for tomorrow (at Long Beach) and the rest of Big West to come.”
George Burning led the Gauchos with 12 kills on a .349 average, Riggs had nine kills and Coordt eight. Setter Cole Schobel dished out 31 assists and added five kills.
