San Francisco, Calif. - Fighting back from down 2-0, the Pacific women's volleyball team could not put the finishing touches to their rally as the Tigers dropped a crushing 3-2 decision on the road at San Francisco on Sat. Oct. 19. The loss ended the first half of conference play with Pacific at 4-5 in WCC action and 11-9 overall while the Dons improved to 5-4 in conference action and 9-10 overall.

Set scores for the match were: 26-24, 25-21, 19-25, 18-25, 15-8.

With the first half of conference action coming to a close on the road at San Francisco, the Tigers could not keep their winning streak alive as Pacific dropped its fourth-straight five-set match as its rally came up just short. Down 2-0 after two sets, the Tigers rallied back to force a fifth-and decisive set only to come up empty in the final frame of play.

The misques throughout the match overshadowed a slew of career performances for the Tigers as sophomore Kat Schulz had the finest offensive match of her young career on the pin for Pacific. The second-year Tiger was nearly unstoppable on the right side as she ended the match with a career-best 21 kills on .500 hitting, finishing the afternoon with no errors. Additionally, Schulz was an all-around force as she addd 15 digs and three blocks to lead Pacific.

Next to Schulz, junior Gillian Howard continued her next-level blocking by posting 10 blocks against the Dons. The 10+ blocks marked the third time in four matches the junior had reached double-digits in blocks. She also added 11 kills on 28 attempts to post her first career double-double.

In the first two sets of the day, the name of the game was serving as Pacific struggled with its passing in reception and its own serving once it got control of the ball. The passing issues did in what otherwise would have been a stellar performance in all other facets of the game as the Tigers outhit and outblocked the Dons throughout most of the first two sets. 

For Pacific, all would change in the sets three and four as the Tigers found their groove in reception while the Dons began to struggle in their own right. The changes enabled the Tigers to get their offense in sink as Pacific hit .283 in set three and a match-high .395 in set four. In each case, Pacific closed out the Dons with late runs as it was a 6-0 run in set three and a 7-0 run in set four.

Despite the momentum of sending the match to a fifth set, the Tigers found themselves trailing big early in set five after giving up six-straight points to San Francisco to trail 6-2. The Tigers would close the gap and knot the final frame at 7-7 before falling behind for good after a trio of hitting errors gave the Dons the 11-7 lead.

For the Dons, the day was dominated in the middle Valentina Zaloznik and Malina Terrell. Zaloznik ended her day with 19 kills on .516 hitting while adding in eight digs and eight blocks for good measure. Terrell finished just short of her teammate with 17 kills on .341 hitting while adding four block. As a team, the Dons hit just .199, but were able to overcome the deficiencies with strong defensive play along the net and in the back row.

The Tigers will look to get back on track in the second half of WCC play on Thursday, Oct. 24 when Pacific hosts No. 20 BYU. The Cougars, who enter the match 9-0 in conference play, enter as the hottest team in the WCC. The match is scheduled for 8:00 pm at the Spanos Center and can be senn nationally on ESPNu.