Northridge Comes Up Short on Long Night in Long Beach

It took a little longer.

Well, OK, it took a lot longer, but the end result was the same.

Long Beach State defeated the Cal State Northridge men’s volleyball team, 6-15, 15-12, 17-16, 15-6, in a Mountain Pacific Sports Federation match Friday night at the Pyramid.

The Matadors’ loss in the hard-fought, well-played match came nearly two months to the day after Northridge was swept by the 49ers in the team’s second match of the year on Jan. 13.

The progress that the Matadors (11-7, 7-5 in conference play) have made since that time was obvious, however, even after the the latest defeat.

Northridge began the night having won six of its last seven matches and ranked third in the nation.

Long Beach (14-4, 10-3 in conference play) was rated fourth nationally.

“It’s tough to lose and it hurts a lot,” Northridge junior outside hitter Collin Smith said.

“But even though we lost, I think this could be a turning point for us. We played hard, and I think our team will battle back.”

Both teams did that, many times, throughout the match and especially in the first three games.

“I thought we played well,” Northridge Coach John Price said. “If we play at this level against most teams, we have a good chance of winning.”

Long Beach rallied in Game 3 behind the play of middle blocker Tom Hoff, a senior All-American who had the deciding kill in a 17-16 win. According to NCAA rules, games, other than the fifth, have a 17-point cap.

Northridge scored six consecutive points to break a 2-2 tie in the first game, won by Northridge, 15-6, in which Dirk Schlueter collected eight kills.

Smith led the Matadors with team highs of 29 kills and 13 digs.

Middle blocker Schlueter finished with 22 kills. Chad Strickland and Jason Hughes added to Northridge’s balanced attack with 19 and 16 kills, respectively, and Ed Bond had nine.

Setter Dan Nash racked up 90 assists.