Volleyball schools Pepperdine, LMU over break

Volleyball schools Pepperdine, LMU over break

By Eric Branch

Daily Bruin Senior Staff

MALIBU — The Pepperdine Waves found out Saturday night exactly
what the top-ranked UCLA men’s volleyball team has in common with a
brick wall. They both have a a way of stopping the momentum of
oncoming objects.

The Waves entered their match with UCLA on a roll, winners of
six of their last seven matches, with their most recent victory
being an impressive sweep of No. 2 Hawaii. However, the Bruins
(20-1 overall, 14-0 in Mountain Pacific Sports Federation) glanced
at No. 11 Pepperdine’s (10-10, 7-10) recent resume and yawned,
blasting their way to a 15-4, 15-6, 15-8 victory before 1,450 at
Firestone Fieldhouse.

Precision passing keyed the Bruin offense on the night,
completely nullifying the Wave’s tough serve. UCLA hit a whopping
.431 while Pepperdine managed just .216 in the one hour and 35
minute match.

"If you pass poorly against Pepperdine they’ll beat you," UCLA
head coach Al Scates said. "They have such a tough serve ­
that’s how they swept Hawaii ­ they just served them off the
court. But the key tonight was that we passed better than they
served."

UCLA senior swing hitter Jeff Nygaard, who posted match-highs of
20 kills and eight blocks, concurred with his coaches’
assessment.

"We always seem to have trouble coming up here but our passing
was just perfect," Nygaard said. "It made it a little easier than
usual tonight."

After Nygaard punched a kill in Pepperdine’s vacated left corner
to close out game one, opposite Paul Nihipali reemerged from a
one-game slump to take over game two. After hitting just .172 in
the Bruins’ previous match against Loyola Marymount, Nihipali
hammered 10 of his 18 kills in the second frame. Nihipali finished
with match-high .577 hitting percentage.

"Paul was definitely rusty in our first game back from break,"
Scates said. "But I think he showed he was back in form
tonight."

At 13-8 in the final game, jump serve specialist Trong Nguyen
aced the Waves twice to put an exclamation point on the
beating.

Swing hitter Kevin Wong threw down 13 kills while setter Stein
Metzger dished out 58 assists.

* * *

The Bruins ripped the bite out of the Loyola Marymount Lions
(7-11, 4-10) Wednesday night at Gersten Pavilion with a 15-11,
15-13, 15-2 sweep.

Nygaard did everything but mop the floor on the night, posting
20 kills (.613 hitting percentage), 12 blocks and seven digs. Wong
contributed 12 kills and a .500 hitting percentage.