April 1, 2011

Final Stats

Stockton, Calif. The No.14 Pacific Tigers fell victim to the No.13 Pepperdine Waves at the Alex G. Spanos Center in a five set battle. The Waves took the first set by a lopsided 25-14 decision before the Tigers won the second 38-36. Pepperdine took the third 25-19, followed by a 25-19 Pacific win in the fourth. In the deciding frame, the Waves won 15-13.

Junior Florian Gornik (Schwechat, Austria) paced Pacific with 24 kills. He did his part on defense as well, recording eight digs.

Redshirt junior Sean Daley (Moorpark, Calif.) added 15 kills off a season-high .625 clip, while redshirt sophomore Taylor Hughes (Fallbrook, Calif.) added an additional 14 kills.

Freshman Javier Caceres (Guaynabo, Puerto Rico) continued his stellar defense recording 20 of the Tigers 51 digs on the night to lead the match in that category.

As a team, pacific slammed down 69 put aways earned on a .225 attack percentage.

Pepperdine was off and running in the first frame, hitting a .545 attack percentage. The Tigers were held to a .143 success rate - a number that was diminished by the Waves' 4.5 blocks.

It was a tale of two teams, as Pacific took to the court in the second set with a renewed focus. Thirty-one ties and 12 lead changes occurred in the second set, while there were a combined 15 set points to give both teams multiple chances to claim the set. The Tigers finally won the marathon game 38-36, to tie the match at one frame a piece.

Pepperdine answered with a 25-19 third-set win before Pacific mirrored the winning score in the fourth stanza.

In the deciding set, the Waves jumped to a 4-1 lead to force the Tigers to call an early timeout. The lead was expanded to four points before Pacific was able to inch its way back into the match. While the Tigers did battle back to tie the score at 12, Pepperdine never relinquished the lead entirely. Up 14-12, Gornik erased one match point with a kill before Pepperdine's Maurice Torres sniped his 26th put down of the match to secure the match for the Waves.

With the result the Tigers fell to 10-16, (4-14 MPSF) on the year while the Waves improved to 9-12, (5-12 MPSF).

The Tigers are next in action Saturday April, 2 when they host top ranked USC at the Alex G. Spanos Center in a match slated for 7:00pm