No. 17 Bruins Win Season Opener at UC Davis
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DAVIS, Calif. - Mac May led the 17th-ranked Bruins with 21 kills and Anna Dodson and élan McCall added 12 kills apiece, as UCLA posted a four-set victory at UC Davis on Sunday at the University Credit Union Center. Set scores were 21-25, 26-24, 27-25, 25-21.
May added eight digs to go with her 17th-career match with at least 20 kills. Dodson hit .526, committing just two errors in 19 attempts with her career-high kill total. McCall was one dig shy of a double-double with nine, adding two aces.
Zoe Fleck produced 15 digs, with her first of the season giving her 1,000 for her collegiate career. Shelby Martin set the Bruins to a .282 hitting percentage in her debut, recording 46 assists and five digs. Iman Ndiaye added seven kills and Emily Ryan tallied four.
UC Davis (0-3) did not trail in the opening set, seeing its lead early grow to as many as four at 15-11. A 7-3 Bruin run on three Dodson kills, one apiece from Martin, May and Allison Jacobs and an Aggie error evened the score at 18. But UC Davis scored the next five points and went on to win the opener 25-21. Dodson produced six kills in the first, while May added four digs. The Bruins were out-hit .375 to .233.
Set two was close, with 11 ties after the first 22 points. Down 14-13, the Bruins scored seven in a row on two kills apiece from Dodson and May and three UC Davis errors. The six-point lead was the largest for UCLA, but it quickly evaporated, as UC Davis came back with a 9-2 run to go back up by one at 23-22. A May kill and a bad Aggie set gave the Bruins a set point, which was saved. But a McCall kill and a Davis attack error closed out a 26-24 win for the Bruins. May posted eight kills in the second, while McCall had four digs. The Bruins out-hit the Aggies .212 to .107.
The Bruins' largest deficit in set three was only one. Up 6-5, a 5-1 run on two May kills, a Dodson ace and two Aggie errors gave UCLA a set-best lead of five at 11-6. UC Davis re-took the lead at 19-18, but a May kill and block with Ryan and an Ndiaye kill made it 21-19 UCLA. The Bruins had the Aggies tie the score four more times to send the set into overtime, but a Davis service error followed by an ace from Kelsey Campeau gave UCLA a 27-25 win. May had seven more kills in the third, McCall added four and Fleck recorded seven digs. The Bruins were out-hit .324 to .239.
UC Davis held the lead throughout most of the fourth set, taking as much as a four-point lead as late as 17-13. McCall scored four of the Bruins' next five points on three kills and an ace as part of a 5-1 run that tied things at 18. After an Aggie sideout gave the home team the lead back, four in a row for UCLA on a service error, a Ryan/May block and kills from May and McCall gave the visitors the lead for good. The final three points came on kills by Martin and May and a solo block from Lexi Hadrych to post a 25-21 win. McCall was error-free in the fourth with six kills in 11 attacks. May added four kills. The Bruins out-hit the Aggies .455 to .375.
The Bruins are back in action on Thursday, Sept. 2 at Long Beach State at 7 p.m.