Long Beach Falls

Long Beach State suffered the biggest drop in the AVCA rankings this week after losing in four sets to UCI. Neither team played particularly well, but UCI was able to pull out the win despite just a .258 hitting percentage for the match to Long Beach's .192.

Jordan DuFault was a bright spot for the Anteaters with 17 kills and a .467 hitting percentage. Carson Clark led UCI with 24 kills. UCI moves up just one spot to No. 7 this week while Long Beach drops three spots to No. 6. Long Beach will have to re-group quickly for two tough matches this weekend against No. 1 USC and No. 9 Pepperdine.

The No. 1 Trojans rolled over both Stanford and Pacific last week in three sets each. While the Trojans were expected to win, the ease of the wins was unexpected. The Trojans never allowed Stanford to get anything going in the match which lasted just over an hour. USC out-hit, out-blocked and out-served the Cardinal by large margins.

Stanford managed to bounce back in time to beat Pepperdine the next night in three sets. The Cardinal rose one spot in the rankings to No. 4 and will take on No. 8 UCLA and No. 3 UCSB this week.

Here are the rest of your matches to watch this week:

Wednesday, Feb. 23
USC @ CSUN
Pepperdine @ Long Beach