Oct. 15, 2005

Box Score

Santa Barbara, Calif. - The Pacific Tigers women's volleyball team battled back from a 2-0 deficit, but fell, 3-2, to UC Santa Barbara on Saturday, Oct. 15. Game scores for the match were 30-25, 30-19, 27-30, 28-30, 15-12. The loss evened Pacific's record at 9-9 on the season and 3-3 in the Big West Conference, while UCSB moved to 10-7 overall and 6-1 in conference.

Down 2-0 in the match, the Tigers returned to the court from the break with one thought, extending the match. Pacific did just that as the Tigers scored a 30-27 victory in game three. The Tigers forced UCSB into seven service errors in game three and took advantage of each one. Pacific led by as many as six points on two different occasions in the third frame, but UCSB pulled even at 24-24.

Sophomore Kara Uhl (Cypress, Calif.) took over for Pacific from there as she had three of her career-high 26 kills on the next three points to give the Tigers a 27-24 lead. Uhl added another kill before the game was over and senior Ashley Groothuis (Aurora, Neb.) punctuated the Pacific win with a cross court kill on the final point of the 30-27 game.

The two teams battled back and forth in game four as the game featured 18 ties. The final deadlock came at 26-26. With Uhl serving, Pacific forced UCSB into back-to-back attack errors to take a 28-26 lead. After the two teams traded points, Groothuis pulled the Tigers even with a kill down the line to give Pacific a 30-28 win.

UCSB, however, took the match with a 15-12 win in game five as the Gauchos scored seven of the final 11 points in the match to claim the victory.

Uhl finished with a career-high 26 kills and 23 digs to lead the Tigers and complete her fourth career double-double. UCSB's Janine Sandell had a match-high 29 kills.

Pacific will be back in action on Thursday, Oct. 20 as the Tigers host UC Riverside at 7 p.m. in the Alex G. Spanos Center.