No. 6 BYU men’s volleyball will travel to California this weekend for its first two Mountain Pacific Sports Federation (MPSF) conference matches of the season. The Cougars are set to play UC Merced on Friday and Jessup on Saturday.
BYU recently experienced two losses against No. 3 Hawai’i, ending a nine-match winning streak and bringing their overall record to 13-4. Despite these setbacks, all of BYU’s defeats have come against teams ranked in the national top four, and the Cougars remain at No. 6 in the AVCA national rankings.
Individually, Trent Moser leads BYU with an average of 3.38 kills per set and a .354 hitting percentage. Tyler Herget is currently second in the conference and fifth nationally with 10.40 assists per set. Gavin Chambers holds second place in the conference and ranks tenth nationally with 1.189 blocks per set. As a team, BYU averages 2.605 blocks per set, which is the fifth-highest rate in the country.
UC Merced enters this weekend with a 3-8 overall record, having lost eight of its last nine matches. The Bobcats are winless in MPSF play so far but have achieved two wins at home this season out of four games played there. Both UC Merced and BYU have faced No. 10 UC San Diego and Menlo; while UC Merced lost to both teams, BYU secured victories against them.
For UC Merced, junior outside hitter Mason Stokes leads with 115 kills this season and is one of three players who have started every match along with Kaleb Cole and Toby Miller.
Jessup stands at an even 6-6 record after dropping two recent home games to No. 7 Pepperdine and also seeks its first conference win after three attempts. Jessup’s only shared opponent with BYU so far has been UC San Diego; Jessup lost that match earlier in January.
Jan Lopuch leads Jessup’s offense with an average of 3.08 kills per set, ranking eighth in the conference, while Colin Marks provides an average of 10.03 assists per set—fourth best in the MPSF. Clement Osahon Jr.’s block average ranks third in the league at 1.179 per set; his .438 hitting percentage leads the conference and is fifth-best nationwide.
This weekend marks the first-ever men’s volleyball meetings between BYU and both UC Merced as well as Jessup.
Both matches will be streamed live on Big Ten Plus.
