49er
volleyball advances to Final Four
Jeff Wootton
Scott
Touzinsky
By
Paul DeCarlo
On-line Forty-Niner
The
49ers, having been to the NCAA Final Four
five times since the program began in 1983,
are not exactly shoe-ins to hoist the national
crown. But this season, Long Beach State
carries a No. 2 ranking to the 2004 Men’s
National Volleyball Championships in Honolulu,
hoping to capture its first national title
in 13 years.
The
Beach caught fire to eliminate UCLA (24-6,
17-5) in a 3-0 sweep (30-25, 30-27, 30-28)
last Thursday in Provo, Utah, hitting a
conference tournament match record .464
percent from the court. However, No. 1-ranked
BYU brought some heat of its own in front
of 3,175 adoring fans Saturday, handing
the 49ers a 3-1 defeat (27-30, 32-30, 30-28,
30-24) at Smith Fieldhouse.
The
momentum, after four straight games on Long
Beach State’s side of the net, had
taken a turn in the Cougars’ favor.
The Beach held a 24-21 advantage in game
two and a 26-23 advantage in game three.
“We
were up going into the late 20s,”
said standout setter Tyler Hildebrand, who
had 60 assists in the match. “They
made some great plays and their crowd gets
into it and they just get on a roll. We
couldn’t capitalize on a couple of
key opportunities that we had.”
Senior
outside hitter Jeff Wootton had a solid
performance with 17 kills and eight digs,
while Scott Touzinsky, Duncan Budinger and
Robert Tarr each had 14 kills in the loss.
“A
lot of times you only get one opportunity
to win a game,” said head coach Alan
Knipe. “We didn’t only get one,
we got three. In that situation it’s
a pretty big emotional swing. They knew
they dodged a huge bullet.”
Despite
the obvious advantage of playing at home,
BYU also held a serious edge in hitting
percentage, .422-to-.286, and team blocks,
17.5-to-10.5 on their way to locking up
the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation title.
Joe Hillman led the way for the Cougars
with 19 kills and Jonathan Alleman added
15 kills in the win. Defensively, Fernando
Pessoa tallied 12 digs and Shawn Olmstead
posted 11.
“There
is an advantage there,” said senior
middle blocker David Lee, “but I don’t
think it’s what made them win. It’ll
be neutral ground next time.”
Against
UCLA, the 49ers relied on stellar efforts
from both Hildebrand, with 49 assists and
nine digs and Touzinsky, who had 14 kills
and seven digs. Wootton and Lee had 13 kills
each in the easy victory. The Beach defense
held the Bruins to a hitting percentage
of only .295. Marcin Jagoda led UCLA with
11 kills and setter Dennis Gonzalez had
40 assists in the defeat.
Long
Beach State will face No. 3-seeded Penn
State (23-6) on Thursday May 6. The game
will be televised live on ESPN2 at 9 p.m.
Penn State is fresh off an Eastern Intercollegiate
Volleyball Association title.
“We’ve
been preparing against teams that are all
at [the top] level,” Lee said. “They
have been playing in a weaker league, so
I think we do have a slight advantage.”
As
for the possibility of a championship rematch
with BYU, the 49ers would love nothing more.
“If
it was all to fall out to script,”
Knipe said, “that’s who we’d
want to play. We have to focus on Penn State.
They are too good a team to worry about
BYU right now.”
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