THOUSAND OAKS, Ca. – The UC Santa Cruz men's volleyball team earned a convincing 3-0 (25-17, 25-18, 25-21) sweep over Wisconsin Lutheran on Friday night ­. UCSC swung at a .366 clip on the night, recording 44 kills as a team with Kyle Ownbey leading the team with 11 of his own and a .563 hitting percentage. Andrew Pak did the heavy lifting at setter, dishing out 27 assists while Riley Norman recorded seven digs. The Slugs will stay in Thousand Oaks as they take on Calvin and Mt. Union tomorrow at California Lutheran University with games set for 12:00 p.m. and 3:00 p.m.
 
How It Happened
Wisconsin Lutheran had the early edge as they struck first and worked to a 7-5 lead, but UC Santa Cruz promptly responded with a 13-5 run with kills from Ethan Makishima, Kyle Ownbey, and Dylan Foreman to take the lead at 18-12. The Warriors tried to rally back but UCSC outscored WLU 7-5 down the stretch to take set one 25-17.
 
The Slugs started the second set on a 4-0 run and didn't look back as they increased their lead to 12-3 following an 8-3 surge that saw kills from Ownbey, Makishima, Foreman, David Polster, and Andrew Pak. WLU briefly went on a run, outscoring the Slugs 6-4 to cut the deficit to 16-9 but UC Santa Cruz went point for point with the Warriors down the stretch to take the set 25-18 and go up 2-0.
 
Set three featured a much more even scoreline in the early going as UCSC narrowly outscored the Warriors 9-8, never leading by more than one point in that stretch. The Banana Slugs finally broke through with an 8-3 run that put them up 17-11 as AJ Contreras, Norman, Ryan Williams, and Makishima led the attack. Wisconsin Lutheran made a late charge, outscoring 10-8 down the stretch but the Slugs secured the 25-21 victory with a kill from Riley Norman to cap off the 3-0 sweep over the Warriors.