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The No. 2-ranked Long Beach State men's volleyball team overcame a slow start and came back to life with more than 2,000 fans at Walter Pyramid in Beach's Big West opener against No. 15 UC Santa Barbara. . After dropping the first set, Long Beach came roaring back and took the match 22-25, 25-21, 25-20, 25-20.
“It was a typical Big West game in many ways,” LBSU coach Alan Kneipp said. “I think when you watch the video and look back, you realize that we had quite a few chances in the first set that we wish we had taken back. But you can't take them back. What you can do is do something about it. . I thought I settled in well.”
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Beach hit .411 in the game with setter Aidan Kneipp dishing out a season-high 52 assists, and his team hit .547 in his 95 sets that night. Skyler Varga hit .395 with 19 kills, Sotiris Siapanis hit .480 and added 15 kills, and Clark Godbold hit .345 with 14 kills.
Beach fell behind, hitting .414 to .333, and lost the first set 25-22. UCSB hit the beach early and took advantage of some early hitting errors to take a 20-13 lead. Beach struggled to keep up as UCSB right-side hitter Geste Bianchi hit .615 with nine kills in the opening frame. For Beach, Skylar Varga had six kills on nine swings, but no other hitter hit above .250.
“The whole first set was a little weird, but we're just trying to move on,” said libero Mason Briggs, who had a match-high 11 digs. “That's what I've taken on as my role: trying to advance myself and extend that to others as well.”
Long Beach State got ahead of the Gauchos in the second set, won a challenge on a touch call and then pulled away late, taking a 24-21 lead that was originally ruled to be 23-22 with the Gauchos within one point. I stole it. Varga continued his hot performance with a big boot for a set point, scoring his 10th goal of the night. Beach won the second set 25-21, outscoring the visiting team by hitting .480 to .375 in the frame, and the blocks were going well, too, with Towie being part of the big momentum with a triple block. I packed 3 books including the book.
The Gauchos got off to a strong start in the third frame, building a 15-13 lead at the break. Beach fought back with a dominant 6-0 run in between UCSB's timeouts to tilt the situation in their favor and quickly take control. Varga continued to have a great night, with Sotiris Siapanis getting his 11th kill and Clark Godbold bouncing back from a slow start to get his 12th kill as Varga hit .375 vs. .267. He outperformed his opponent and won the set.
Varga said the 6-0 run with the Pyramid Shaking was the highlight.
“That kind of momentum is a lot of fun when everyone is into it,” he said. “At first I started feeling sleepy, but as I run, I feel more energetic.”
The Beach was in complete control in the fourth set, riding a huge wave of praise from the Pyramid crowd with a number of high-flying moves. The highlight was Aidan Knipe's well-timed big bouncer up the middle from Lazar Bushkov, followed by a pancake dig by Knipe that led to a big open-net kill by Siapanis to give Beach an 11-6 lead. Beach took a 15-11 lead on the break when libero Mason Briggs made a dodgeball duck and the Gaucho hit a slightly long serve.
UCSB got within one point at 17-16 with a kill off the block, but a service error followed by an attack error on an overpass attempt and big blocks from Buchkov and Siapanis put Beach back up 20-16. They took the frame 25-20 on a Godbold kill from Brock.
Bianchi led UCSB with 25 kills, and no other Gaucho reached double digits. The Beaches will play UCSB again on Saturday night in Santa Barbara on short notice.
