NCAA Men’s Volleyball Tournament : Pepperdine Starts Slowly, Then Finishes Off USC

It was a long, painful process, but in the end, Pepperdine prevailed, holding off a relentless USC team to win the NCAA volleyball title at Pauley Pavilion Saturday night before a crowd of 6,378.

For more than 2 hours 15 minutes they battled, until, in the end, Pepperdine had a 10-15, 15-10, 15-7, 15-13 victory. Claiming to be not a bit surprised at the fight put up by the Trojans, Pepperdine Coach Marv Dunphy said: “We knew we’d have a dogfight. All of our matches with them have been long, hard-fought matches.”

The victory provided a nice sendoff for Dunphy, who will now take a three-year leave to coach the U.S. national team and the 1988 U.S. Olympic team.

Dunphy was just leaving the last time Pepperdine won the NCAA volleyball title. He was taking time off, then, to get his doctorate. His first title, in 1978, is the only other NCAA title peperdine has won, in any sport.

USC had won the volleyball title twice before, in 1977 and 1980.

USC started strong, taking a 6-0 lead in the first game and doing some good blocking to hold on for a 15-10 win. “I probably made a coaching error in that first game,” Dunphy said. “I tried to throw a new wrinkle at them by flip-flopping my frontlines.

“It didn’t work, but I felt like we had to try something. You can’t just pussyfoot around and wait for a good team to lose, you have to try to beat them.”

USC started strong, taking a 6-0 lead in the first game and using a strong game at the net to hold off a tenacious challenge from Pepperdine the rest of the way to win the game, 15-10.

Pepperdine took the initiative in the second game, going up 3-0, but, again, it was a long, drawn-out effort to wrap up the game as the Trojans kept battling back.

In the third game, Pepperdine was more in control, managing a couple of short streaks and finishing up with six straight points after the Trojans had closed to within 9-7.

Pepperdine seemed to have the upper hand in the fourth game, too, taking a 7-1 lead, but the Trojans came back to take a 9-7 lead, then a 10-9 lead, leaving it up to Pepperdine to come from behind. 14-11. But with Steve Friedman serving for the final point, a Pepperdine player went into the net and the final point was not scored until after the Trojans had scored two more points and the Waves had failed on two more serves.

Finally, after a long volley, Pepperdine won it all when USC’s Bill Yardley hit the ball into the net.

USC Coach Bob Yoder said: “We expected to come in an win, and we thought we could. But they proved they were the better team. . . . In the game we won, we played some good defense and made some digs, but we didn’t stop their outside hitters.”

In the consolation game, George Mason beat Ball State, 15-12, 15-6, 15-5.