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sports
Beach sweeps UC
Riverside
By Marten Lewerth
On-line Forty-Niner
The Long Beach
State women's volleyball team notched its sixth sweep of the
season with a 30-14, 30-5, 30-23 decision over Big West Conference
foe UC Riverside Friday at The Pyramid.
Elisha Thomas and Brittany Hochevar led the second-ranked
49ers (9-0, 3-0 BWC) with 10 kills each in the first-ever
meeting between Long Beach State and UCR as conference rivals.
From the opening serve by Tracy Bulquerin to the final kill
by Cheryl Weaver, the outcome of the match was never seriously
in question. The Beach held the Highlanders (7-5, 0-3 BWC)
to negative hitting percentages in Games 1 and 2, and only
in Game 3 did UCR manage to connect for more than seven kills.
This is the first year of Big West Conference and Division
I competition for UCR, a fact that was not overlooked by the
49ers.
"Coming to this level and then coming to The Pyramid
and playing [a highly-ranked] team, I would have been scared,
but they played a great game," said 49er Ashanti Taylor,
who finished with six kills. "They were in there digging
balls that Stanford or Nebraska wouldn't dig, they had so
much heart."
The Beach hit .433 in the contest and Tayyiba Haneef led all
players with a .727 attack percentage, tallying eight kills
on 11 attempts. Haneef also served up a career-best five aces
and tied her career-high in digs with 10.
"She didn't get into the offense quite as much as I thought
she would, but her serve is coming along," said 49er
Head Coach Brian Gimmillaro. "It's getting better and
better."
Weaver had a relatively quiet match, finishing with nine kills
and six digs, but made her mark at the front of the net with
six blocks. Hochevar and Thomas also excelled at the net,
helping the 49ers to finish with 13.0 team blocks, and setter
Keri Nishimoto dished out 34 assists.
Katie DeRoss led the Highlanders with 10 kills and four digs.
Up next for The Beach is a conference match against No. 11
Pacific Thursday at Stockton. The Tigers stand at 12-2 (3-0
BWC) on the season and are led by sophomore Jennifer Joines,
who has a conference-best 4.93 kills per game percentage.
"Pacific will be an amped game -- Stockton is a brutal
place to play," Hochevar said. "But, as long as
we take care of what we got going on our side of the net,
I don't think there's anybody in the country that can stop
us."
LBSU has not beaten Pacific since 1998 and trails the all-time
series, 23-18.
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