LA JOLLA, Calif. ? The 12th-ranked UC San Diego men's volleyball team lost to No. 2 UC Irvine 30-25, 30-28, 30-24 on Wednesday night in RIMAC Arena. The loss drops UCSD to 6-9 overall, 2-8 Mountain Pacific Sports Federation, while the Anteaters improve to 13-3, 10-2 MPSF. UCSD was outhit .418 - .144 and outblocked 15.5 ? 2.0 which proved to be the difference. UCSD was led by Frank Fritsch with 11 kills, while Will Ehrman added 10 kills. Gerald Houseman had seven kills on .417 hitting. UC Irvine was paced by Jon Steller with 12 kills on .600 hitting.
Also for the Tritons, Phil Bannan had 36 assists and six digs while Jason Spangler added nine kills. Eric Leserman had six digs and six different Tritons recorded service aces.
In addition to Steller's 12 kills for UCI, Jordan DuFault added nine kills and six kills were recorded by Austin D'Amore. DuFault also added nine blocks.
In the first set, the Tritons fell behind early at 15-10. The Tritons cut the UCI lead down to 20-17 after a Houseman kill, forcing UCI to call timeout. UCSD scored two points out of the timeout on an error and Fritsch kill to come within 21-20. After a DuFault kill, UCI never let the Tritons come closer than 24-22. UCI would take the set 30-25.
The second set was the closest of the night with nine ties. The Tritons fell behind 10-7 but rallied to quickly tie the set at 13-13 after kills by Ehrman and Fritsch. UCI recorded a kill and three consecutive blocks to lead 17-13. The Tritons would come back to tie the set at 22-22 after a Fritch kill. Another tie would come at 23-23 before a UCI kill and another block pushed the UCI lead to 25-23. UCSD came back to tie the set at 27-27, but Cory Yoder sent down a kill and a UCSD error gave UCI set point. Steller put the set away for the Anteaters at 30-28.
The third set was all UCI as the Anteaters took a 20-13 lead. UCI led by as many as nine points and closed the set 30-24.
UCSD is back in action when it hosts No. 9 UCLA on Saturday night. First serve is set for 7:00 p.m. in RIMAC Arena.
