Bruins Go Down in Straight Sets at UC Irvine

The No. 12 UCLA men's volleyball team saw its season come to an end on Saturday night in a straight set loss at top-seeded UC Irvine in the first round of the MPSF Playoffs. Scores of the match were 17-25, 18-25, 15-25 as No.2-ranked UCI captured its 17 win in the last 18 matches. UCLA finishes with a 13-14 overall record.

MPSF Freshman of the Year J.T. Hatch led UCLA with 13 kills, hit .385 and added an ace and nine digs. Jake Arnitz chipped in with six kills and a block. Senior Trent Kersten totaled five kills and a .400 hitting percentage and will finish his career as one of UCLA's most efficient players ever in attack percentage. Jackson Bantle had six digs.

UC Irvine, which entered the match as the NCAA's top-ranked team in hitting percentage, banged out a Bruin opponent season-best .481 in the contest to the Bruin's total of .202. The Anteaters hit over .500 in sets one and three.UCI totaled 8.0 total blocks to UCLA's 1.0. The Bruin total of two block assists was a season-low.

Irvine jumped out to a 1-3 lead in set one. The Bruins came back to get to 4-5 on an 'Eater service error and trailed 5-7 after a kill by Hatch. UCI then went out to an 8-13 edge. A Hatch kill closed the gap to 11-14, but Irvine pulled away to lead 13-18. UCLA came back again to get to 15-18 on a UCI service error and a kill by Mitch Stahl. The Bruins were able to save a couple of set points, but the deficit was too great to overcome and UCI captured the set 17-25.

In set two, UCI again launched out to early leads of 1-3 and 2-5. UCLA came back to even the score at 5-all after consecutive kills by Trent Kersten, Jake Arnitz and Hatch. UCLA went ahead 7-6 following a service error and 10-9 after an ace from Hatch. A kill by Arnitz made it 12-10 for the Bruins. The home team then recorded the next five points to go up 12-15. UCLA cut it to 13-15 on a kill by Kersten, but would not get closer down the stretch. The Anteaters pulled away to a 14-20 advantage. UCLA found one more run and trailed 17-20 after kills by Arnitz and Hatch to go along with a Michael Fisher ace. UCI answered for an 18-25 win.

UCI surged to a 2-7 lead in begin set three. UCLA made it 6-11 following a kill by Kersten, however Irvine quickly tallied the next four points. Senior Clayton Paullin registered three kills and an ace down the stretch, but it was not enough and the Bruins fell 15-25 in the final set.