Fresh off a victory at USC, UCSB’s men’s volleyball team travels to UCLA and Long Beach for a pair of matches this week.
The win at USC, which snapped a four-match losing streak, was UCSB’s first road victory of the season.
UCSB will be the underdog going into the games against No. 6 UCLA (11-8, 7-6) and No. 3 Long Beach State (12-4, 10-3) this week. In this season, the Gauchos have come up short against the Bruins twice and both were home games.
Even though Long Beach State has a better record than UCSB, the Gauchos were victorious in the last meeting. UCSB swept the 49ers in three sets, with a big performance by Matt Marsh with 15 kills and Weston Nielsen with 12 kills.
The Gauchos (6-11, 4-9) came out energized in their last match and took the first two sets from USC, ultimately winning the game in four. UCSB was able to shut down the Trojan offense with 21.5 total team blocks. Dylan Davis led the team with 14 total blocks and Kevin Donohue had seven. Evan Licht had his best night of the season and led the Gauchos with 13 kills. The Gauchos also had their best serving night of the season, nailing ten aces. Austin Kingi was a major force from behind the line and recorded a career-high of 3 serving aces.
Wednesday’s match at Pauley Pavilion begins at 7 p.m., as does Friday’s match at the Long Beach Pyramid.
