MALIBU, CALIFORNIA – Trinity Western defeated Pepperdine 3-1 (25-22, 18-25, 26-24, 25-22) for the second time in the Spartans tour of California’s finest men’s volleyball programs on Sunday.
The Spartans now boast a solid record of 4-1 during their California tour.
The win comes against an impressive Pepperdine team, who were ranked fifth in last year’s final NVA/AVCA Division I-II Men’s Coaches Poll. The Spartans are now 5-4 all-time against the Pepperdine Waves.
QUOTABLE
TWU Head Coach Ben Josephson
“A way better volleyball match than the one we played them [Pepperdine] on Wednesday. I told their coach that I’m really excited to see how good that team gets that season if that’s what their improvements look like after four days. I also felt that this game was the most uncomfortable I’ve felt as a coach in a long time, and that’s just credit to them.
“They upgraded their receiving, so we didn’t get any easy points on serves. Their defence was incredible, we were running really good plays that usually score, but they found ways to keep it alive. So, we had no quick points on serves, we had no easy kill shots, and then they exploited our blocking in a really cool way using some speed and some shots that we usually don’t see in our gym.
“One of the goals of this trip is to expose our team to a high level of volleyball, and a very different style of play and personality. Pepperdine is probably the hardest team we had to figure out so far. It was an eye-opening experience playing for our team on what it takes to beat a team who is that good at ball control, and that positive in the way they transition.
“We’ll get better of these things now that we have seen it. That is the beauty of this trip, we got so many lessons we get to take back to Canada that we have exposed, and new lessons that we have taken from these teams in watching their strengths. We are getting better day by day and we’re going to be a way better team after learning from these clubs.
“Long Beach State tomorrow. Another really great volleyball team who are really well coached. They play a similar system to us too, so that is going to be a fun match testing ourselves against a mirror image team. We’re excited for that, hopefully we can recover and have a great performance and wrap up this California tour in a different city.”
UP NEXT
The Spartans are set to take on the Big West volleyball powerhouse, Long Beach State, at 6 p.m. on Monday. Long Beach State finished the 2020-21 season with a 7-5 record to earn the eighth spot in last year’s final NVA/AVCA Division I-II Men’s Coaches Poll.
SCHEDULE
Nov. 10 vs. Pepperdine – 3-2 W
SAC Tournament
Nov. 12 vs. UCSB – 3-0 W
Nov. 13 vs. USC – 3-1 L
Nov. 13 vs. UCLA – 3-0 W
Nov. 14 vs. Pepperdine – 3-1 W
Nov. 15 vs. Long Beach State – 6 p.m. (PT)
Nov. 16 vs. Long Beach State – 6 p.m. (PT)
TWU’S ALL-TIME RECORD vs. NCAA DIV. I OPPONENTS
BYU – 2-2
Cal State Northridge – 1-1
George Mason – 0-1
Lewis – 2-2
Long Beach State – 3-1
Pacific – 3-1
Pepperdine – 5-4
Purdue Fort Wayne – 2-0
Stanford – 0-1
UC Irvine – 0-1
UCLA – 5-2
UC Santa Barbara – 2-2
USC – 2-2
About Spartan Athletics
As official members of U SPORTS, the Spartans currently compete in 13 sports in the Canada West conference, including women’s and men’s soccer, volleyball, basketball, hockey, cross country and track & field, as well as women’s rugby sevens. TWU also competes as an independent team in men’s rugby. Since TWU entered U SPORTS in 1999, the Spartans have won 12 U SPORTS team championships and 29 Canada West team championships.
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