ROMEOVILLE, Ill. – Lewis University's seventh ranked men's volleyball team heads to Southern California for a pair of matches this weekend against fifth ranked Pepperdine on Friday (Jan. 28) and second ranked UCLA on Saturday (Jan. 29). Friday's match starts at 9 p.m. (CT) while Saturday's match is at 7 p.m. (CT).
Last Time Out – The Flyers went 1-1 last weekend falling to third ranked Long Beach State 3-1 last Friday evening and then bounced back on Saturday sweeping Belmont Abbey. Friday's match against The Beach was tightly contested as there were 27 ties and 13 lead changes in the first three sets. Lewis dropped the first two sets by identical set scores of 25-22 but came back to win set three 26-24 before falling set four 25-20.
On Saturday, the Flyers got career-high performances from
Jason Gibbs (Bellaire, Texas/Bellarie) (11 kills) and
Carter Burzlaff (Elgin, Ill./Bartlett High School) (10 kills) while
Tyler Morgan (Dike, Iowa/New Hartford) added 31 assists and seven blocks and
Carlos Jimenez (Miami Beach, Fla./FLVS) had six digs in the sweep of the Crusaders.
AVCA Rankings – Lewis remained seventh in this week's AVCA Division I-II Top 15 poll and extended its streak of being ranked to 183 weeks which includes 61 straight weeks in the top 10. The last time the Flyers weren't ranked in the AVCA Poll was on Jan. 31, 2011.
About Pepperdine – The Waves enter Friday's match with a record of 3-1 and are ranked fifth in this week's AVCA poll. Pepperdine went 1-1 a week ago defeating Princeton in straight sets before falling to UC Santa Barbara in a five-set match last Friday.
The Waves are hitting .368 as a team while averaging 12.29 kills per set. Spencer Wickens leads the offensive attack with 34 kills while Jaylen Jasper and Austin Wilmot have 31 and 30 kills respectively. Bryce Dvorak is the team's primary setter and is averaging 10.1 assists per set. Defensively, Wilmot and Andersen Fuller lead the way on the front line with 16 and 14 blocks respectively while on the back line Trey Cole has 18 digs.
About UCLA – The Bruins enter Thursday's match against Cal State Northridge with a record of 3-0 and are ranked second in this week's AVCA poll. UCLA went 2-0 last week in the Pac 12/Big Ten Challenge defeating Ohio State in five sets last Friday and then knocked off Penn State in four sets on Saturday.
The Bruins are averaging 12.4 kills per set while hitting .328 as a team. Ethan Champlin leads the attack with 29 kills while Kevin Kobrine and Guy Genis have 23 and 21 kills respectively. Miles Partain runs the offense and is averaging 9.5 assists per set. Genis, Partain and Merrick McHenry each have nine blocks to lead the team and Partain leads the way on the back line with 24 digs.
Series Stuff - Friday's contest marks the seventh meeting all-time between with Pepperdine having won four of the first six. The Waves won the last meeting between the two teams 3-1 in Romeoville during the 2019 season.
Saturday's contest is the 21st meeting all-time between the Flyers and Bruins with UCLA having won 18 of the first 20 meetings. The Bruins won the last meeting between the two 3-1 on Feb. 2, 2019 at Neil Carey Arena.
Up Next – The Flyers begin a four-game homestand next Friday (Feb. 4) hosting Central State at 7 p.m. The homestand continues on Saturday (Feb. 5) against Grand Canyon at 7 p.m. Lewis opens MIVA play the following weekend hosting Ball State on (Feb. 10) at 7 p.m. and Ohio State (Feb. 12) at 5 p.m.
