Feb. 23, 2007

Box Score

Malibu, Calif. - The ninth ranked Pacific men's volleyball dropped a hard fought match to No. 1 Pepperdine, 3-1 on Friday, Feb. 23.

With the loss the Tigers evened their overall record this season at 8-8 and fell to 6-6 in the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation. Pepperdine, meanwhile, moved to 13-1 on the season and 11-1 in conference play.

Pacific got off to a tremendous start in the match as the Tigers took game one, 30-24, by hitting a combined .444 as a team. Pacific tallied 18 kills on just 33 swings, committing only four errors.

In the second game, the top-ranked Waves responded with a eight of the first 10 points to build an early 8-2 edge. Pacific, however, proved equal to the challenge as the Tigers responded with seven of the next nine points, led by two service aces from junior Pekka Seppanen (Kuopio, Finland). Game two remained tight the rest of the way as the two teams battled back and forth. Late in the game, Pepperdine held two game points at 29-27, but the Tigers got back-to-back kills from senior Matt Cornell (Granada Hills, Calif.) and junior Simon Chen-Byerley (Northfield, Ill.) to pull even at 29-29. The Tigers fought off another game point at 30-29 on a kill from Seppanen, but eventually dropped game two, 32-30.

Knotted at one game each, Pepperdine showed why they are the No. 1 team in the nation as the Waves held Pacific to a combined .003 hitting percentage over the last two games (23 kills, 21 errors on 74 attempts) as the Waves defeated the Tigers 30-21 and 30-22 to take the match.

Cornell led Pacific with 20 kills in the match, while Pepperdine's Paul Carroll posted a match-high 26 kills.

The Tigers return to the court on Sunday, Feb. 25 as Pacific heads to Los Angeles, Calif. to take on No. 14 USC.