California Baptist University
Cal State Northridge
For The Long Haul
1/31/2013 5:27:00 AM | Men's Volleyball
The Lancers won 3-1 (25-23, 25-19, 24-26, 25-22) to move to 2-2 in the conference and 5-4 overall.
"We settled in and did a little better tonight," said CBU Head Coach Wes Schneider. "I still think we have a ways to go to get back to where we were, but hopefully with a few days of rest and practice we can get back to where we need to be and keep it going from here."
CBU jumped out to a 6-0 lead out of the gates in the opening set and never trailed in the game. The Matadors did claw back to even the set at 22-22, but Guilherme Koepp kept the Lancers ahead with a rip. Levi Cabral and Amir Lugo-Rodriguez then finished it off with kills of their own.
The Lancers used a four-point run midway through the second game to go up 15-10 and rode that cushion to a six-point victory.
The Matadors thwarted a CBU comeback from five points down in the third game, winning in extra points on an ace by Sam Holt that just grazed a CBU player before falling out of bounds.
The Lancers again had to play from behind in the fourth, but this time completed the comeback.
After taking a lead midway through the set, CBU went up by as much as five late and closed it out with two kills from Koepp.
Cabral ripped a match high 24 kills on the night and CBU hit .260 as a team. The Lancers had 19 more kills (60-41) than the Matadors. Lugo-Rodriguez added nine kills with not errors on 14 attempts (.643).
CSUN falls to 4-3 overall, 2-3 MPSF with the loss.
"We're in the MPSF and we're playing all the big guys every single match," said Schneider. "We just need to figure out a solid game plan, stick with it and have confidence that we can play with it, because we know we can. There's not going to be an easy match so we have to be consistent."
The Lancers head to Santa Barbara next for a matchup with the 12th ranked Gauchos on Tuesday and then host No. 5 UCLA on Thursday, Feb. 7. CBU's home matchup against the Bruins will be in the Van Dyne Gym at 7 p.m.
