The Beach Drops Hard-Fought Four-Set Road Contest to the Gauchos

Tuesday, October 29

Santa Barbara, Calif.

7:00 PM

Long Beach State University

7-14, 4-5

UC Santa Barbara

19-2, 9-1

Long Beach State

UC Santa Barbara

Photo by: John Fajardo

The Beach Drops Hard-Fought Four-Set Road Contest to the Gauchos

10/29/2019 9:56:00 PM | Women's Volleyball

Box Score

Three players reached double-figure kills led by Kashauna Williams’ 21-kill performance

By: Lindy Zamora, Associate Athletic Communications Director

Box Score (PDF)

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. – The Long Beach State women's volleyball team battled UC Santa Barbara through a total of 43 ties and 20 lead changes in a hard-fought contest that saw the Gauchos outlast the Beach, 3-1 [22-25, 25-22, 29-31, 15-25].

The Beach (7-14, 4-5 Big West) turned in a solid effort as they battled the Gauchos (19-2, 9-1 Big West) on the road. UCSB out-hit LBSU .294 to .204, but the Beach held the advantage in digs with 56 to 55.

Long Beach State's defense was led by senior libero Hailey Harward who finished the match with 12 digs. She led a slew of players with solid defensive efforts as freshman Jade Waskom added nine digs, while Carly Aigner-Swesey, Carly Hill, Kashauna Williams, and Nicole Hoff each added six digs.

Williams led the offensive attack with 21 kills, while Avery Nelson and YiZhi Xue contributed 14 and 10 kills, respectively. Xue led the Beach with a .364 attack percentage, while adding three blocks at the net.

Aigner-Swesey paced the offense with 36 assists, while Harward contributed seven.
The firs
t set was a competitive one as Long Beach and UC Santa Barbara battled through 10 ties and five lead changes. The Beach went up, 20-17, but the Gauchos battled back and evened the score at 20-all. The two teams found themselves deadlocked at 21-21, before UCSB took the lead for good on a Beach attack error. The Gauchos closed out the first set with back-to-back kills from Lindsey Ruddins as LBSU fell, 25-22.

Another back-and-forth affair in the second set saw the conference foes trade leads five times and fight through 15 lead changes before Long Beach State broke a 16-16 tie on a kill off the hands of Katie Kennedy. From there, the Beach held at least a one-point lead before back-to-back kills by Avery Nelson put LBSU on top 22-19, forcing a UCSB timeout. Following the break in action, Long Beach State put the game away, 25-22, on two more kills by Nelson.

LBSU opened the third set on a 4-1 run, however, UC Santa Barbara battled back and evened the score at 6-all. From that point on, the Beach and the Gauchos were neck-and-neck. The two teams pushed each other to seven set points, before UC Santa Barbara prevailed on a kill by Ruddins followed by an ace from Zoe Fleck, 31-29.

Following three very close and competitive games, UC Santa Barbara found its groove in the fourth set as the Gauchos hit .414, while holding the Beach to just .061. UCSB capitalized on LBSU's mistakes and opened up a double-digit lead (19-9) before cruising to a 25-15 win.

UCSB was led by Lindsey Ruddins 21 kills, while Tallulah Froley posted 13 kills. Setters Romoni Vivao and Olivia Lovenberg paced the offense dishing out 27 and 23 assists, respectively.

Long Beach State returns to the Walter Pyramid to host UC Riverside and UC Davis on Friday and Saturday, respectively. First serve for both matches is set for 7 p.m.