BYU-Hawaii beats Seattle Pacific 3-1 in NCAA II West Region Quarterfinals

Courtesy BYU-Hawaii Sports Information

SAN BERNARDINO, CA - The BYU-Hawaii volleyball team defeated Seattle Pacific 3-1 on Thursday, Nov. 17, in the opening round of the NCAA Division II West Regional Tournament in San Bernardino, CA.

The Seasiders advance to the West Region Semifinals where they will take on top-seed and host Cal State San Bernardino on Friday, Nov. 18, at 7:30 p.m. PST. The Coyotes knocked off 8th seed Alaska Anchorage to advance and remain unbeaten at 28-0.

The other semifinal contest will put #3 seed Sonoma State against #2 seed UC San Diego at 5 p.m. PST. Sonoma State defeated #6 Hawai‘i Hilo 3-1, while UC San Diego bounced #7 Grand Canyon 3-0.

The NCAA II West Region Championship will be held on Saturday, Nov. 19, at 7 p.m. in San Bernardino.

The Seasiders overcame the stubborn Falcons in a 25-21, 25-21, 15-25, 30-28 win to improve to 19-3 overall. The win was the 16th in a row for BYU-Hawaii.

The Seasiders broke away from an 18-18 tie in the opening set to pull away for the win while hitting .312 compared to just .137 by the Falcons.

BYU-Hawaii followed a similar pattern in the second set by pulling away from a 16-16 tie to win with a .286 hitting mark vs. .156 for the Falcons. However, the Seasiders’ hitting struggled in game three as BYU-Hawaii made 11 hitting errors for a .000 percentage to hand the set to Seattle Pacific.

BYU-Hawaii started quickly in the fourth game, going up 8-1. But the Falcons battled back to tie the game at 13-13 before pulling out to an 18-15 lead.

The Seasiders tied the contest 19-19 but the Falcons pulled back into the lead. Seattle Pacific held set point at 24-23 but Stella Chen knocked down a kill to tie things up.

The Falcons had a second set point at 25-24 but Chen once again put down a kill to tie the score.

The Seasiders then squandered a pair of set points at 26-25 and 27-26 before Seattle Pacific got a third chance to win the set at 28-27.

Lauren Hagemeyer pounded a kill for the Seasiders to knot the score a final time before Ariel Hsu put away a step-out kill and Courtney Skaggs served an ace to win the match.

Stella Chen finished with 21 kills and 25 digs to lead the Seasiders. Hagemeyer knocked down 20 kills and Hsu finished with 11 kills and no hitting errors for a .478 percentage.

Losaline Pula came up with 25 digs to match Chen and Michelle Chen had 13 digs to go with her 50 assists and two service aces. Tajana Santiago earned 12 digs and Aika Becker 10 for BYU-Hawaii.

Skaggs led the way at the net defensively with four blocks for the Seasiders.

Seattle Pacific, which finished the season 21-7, received 24 kills from Lindsey Wodrich and 46 digs from Anna Herold.