Gauchos too Much for Cougars

SANTA BARBARA -- The BYU men's volleyball team dropped its Mountain Pacific Sports Federation opener to UC Santa Barbara, 26-30, 27-30, 32-30, 29-31, Friday night at Robertson Gym.

BYU Coach Tom Peterson noted that errors and poor serving were what allowed Santa Barbara to control the match.

"We had too many errors to win against an very good team tonight," Peterson said. "The worst thing you can do is miss your serves. The next worst thing is serve an easy serve. We did both and that allowed them to get points at critical times."

The Cougars struggled early in the match and never recovered as the Gauchos out hit BYU in every game. The Cougars hit just .147 and .229 in games one and two compared to .385 and .375 for Santa Barbara.

BYU managed to capture a close game three but the Gauchos remained hot and came back in the fourth to hit .441 and take the game, 31-29, and win the match.

Freshman outside hitter Ivan Perez was solid for the Cougars, finishing with 17 kills while hitting at a .361 clip (17-4-36) and picking up a career-high 13 digs. Junior Victor Batista, who struggled with hitting errors, also had 17 kills and a team-high six blocks.

Despite limited opportunities, middles Russell Holmes and Michael Burke combined to have a strong match. Together the pair notched 16 kills and hit a blistering .625 (16-1-24). Holmes, a freshman, hit a career-high .818 (9-0-11) on the night.

Santa Barbara went to its big gun, Evan Patak, all night. The 6-8 opposite hitter had his second 30-kill match of the season, registering 32 while hitting .418 (32-9-55). He also added five aces. Peterson said the Cougars let Patak do too much in the match.

"I think we let Patak just beat us in a lot of ways, both hitting and serving," Peterson said.

Bryan Berman and Michael Kennedy also finished with double figure kills, contributing 11 and 10 respectively.

For the match, the Cougars hit .281 (67-29-135) while the Gauchos had a hitting percentage of .405 (68-16-131). BYU added 10 aces, 35 digs, and 8.5 blocks.

Despite the poor performance, Peterson noted he is confident his team will pull through and become a very good team.

"We'll adjust and get better," Peterson said. "It's tough to lose your league opener to a team you can beat. Our learning curve is pretty steep because of so many new people. We'll get it together and be a pretty good team at some point. We just need to hurry up and get there."

The Cougars, now 4-2 overall and 0-1 in MPSF play, will be back in action again tomorrow night against Santa Barbara at 5 p.m. PST (6 p.m. MST).

                              Volleyball Box Score
                      Briham Young University - Volleyball
                    Brigham Young Univ. vs UC Santa Barbara
                     (Jan 21, 2005 at Santa Barbara, Calif)
    Brigham Young Univ.    |     ATTACK      |SET| SERVE |SRV|DEF|  BLOCK |GEN
 ## Name                 GP|  K   E  TA   PCT|  A| SA  SE| RE|DIG|BS BA BE|BHE|POINTS
 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 3  BURKE, Michael......  4|  7   1  13  .462|  1|  0   2|  0|  0| 0  4  0|  0|   9.0
 8  PEREZ, Ivan.........  4| 17   4  36  .361|  0|  2   4|  2| 13| 0  1  1|  0|  19.5
 9  PATTERSON, Casey....  4|  9   7  19  .105|  1|  1   2|  0|  3| 1  0  0|  0|  11.0
 11 HOLMES, Russell.....  4|  9   0  11  .818|  0|  0   1|  0|  0| 0  3  0|  0|  10.5
 14 NEILSON, Rob........  4|  2   1   4  .250| 59|  3   1|  0|  6| 0  1  0|  2|   5.5
 15 BATISTA, Victor.....  4| 17  15  45  .044|  2|  3   0|  1|  6| 0  6  0|  0|  23.0
 6  HEYES, Matt.........  3|  0   0   0  .000|  0|  0   1|  0|  0| 0  0  0|  0|   0.0
 7  ROWLEY, Brian.......  4|  1   0   1 1.000|  1|  0   0|  2|  6| 0  0  0|  0|   1.0
 17 EVANS, Taylor.......  3|  5   1   6  .667|  1|  1   2|  1|  1| 0  0  0|  0|   6.0
    TEAM................   |                 |   |       |  1|   |        |   |   0.0
 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Totals..............  4| 67  29 135  .281| 65| 10  13|  7| 35| 1 15  1|  2|  85.5
 TEAM ATTACK PER GAME                               TOTAL TEAM BLOCKS: 8.5
 Game  K  E  TA   Pct
   1  15 10  30  .167   GAME SCORES               1  2  3  4  TEAM RECORDS
   2  16  8  35  .229   Brigham Young Univ.. (1) 26 27 32 29  4-1, 0-1 MPSF
   3  20  6  39  .359   UC Santa Barbara.... (3) 30 30 30 31  3-3, 3-0 MPSF
   4  16  5  31  .355
    UC Santa Barbara       |     ATTACK      |SET| SERVE |SRV|DEF|  BLOCK |GEN
 ## Name                 GP|  K   E  TA   PCT|  A| SA  SE| RE|DIG|BS BA BE|BHE|POINTS
 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 4  Berman, Bryan.......  4| 11   2  20  .450|  2|  1   4|  1|  1| 0  1  0|  0|  12.5
 6  Jensen, Dane........  4|  2   0   6  .333| 42|  1   4|  1|  7| 1  2  0|  2|   5.0
 7  Patak, Evan.........  4| 32   9  55  .418|  0|  5   3|  0|  9| 1  1  0|  0|  38.5
 13 Wack, Nate..........  4|  7   3  19  .211|  1|  0   3|  5|  5| 1  2  0|  0|   9.0
 21 Brunner, Theo.......  4|  4   0  10  .400|  2|  0   3|  0|  0| 1  2  0|  0|   6.0
 25 Kennedy, Michael....  4| 10   1  19  .474|  1|  0   0|  0|  0| 2  4  1|  0|  14.0
 1  Kowalski, Bart......  2|  0   0   0  .000|  7|  0   0|  0|  2| 0  0  0|  0|   0.0
 8  Fisher, Michael.....  3|  0   0   0  .000|  0|  0   1|  0|  0| 0  0  0|  0|   0.0
 10 Ulfers, Adam........  1|  0   0   0  .000|  0|  0   0|  0|  0| 0  0  0|  0|   0.0
 19 Mansfield, Aaron....  4|  0   0   0  .000|  6|  0   0|  2|  7| 0  0  0|  0|   0.0
 33 Richman, Aaron......  1|  2   0   2 1.000|  0|  0   1|  1|  1| 0  0  0|  0|   2.0
 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Totals..............  4| 68  15 131  .405| 61|  7  19| 10| 32| 6 12  1|  2|  87.0
 TEAM ATTACK PER GAME                               TOTAL TEAM BLOCKS: 12.0
 Game  K  E  TA   Pct
   1  14  4  26  .385   Site: Santa Barbara, Calif (Robertson Gym)
   2  16  4  32  .375   Date: Jan 21, 2005   Attend: 342   Time: 2:30
   3  19  3  39  .410   Referees: Tony Chan, Rick Olmstead
   4  19  4  34  .441