MALIBU, California – David Wieczorek and Michael Wexter combined for 28 of the Waves' 40 kills as the top-seeded and fourth-ranked Pepperdine men's volleyball team swept BYU, 25-17, 25-23, 25-18, in Thursday's Mountain Pacific Sports Federation semifinals.
 
The Waves (21-6) now advance to Saturday's championship match in Firestone Fieldhouse against USC. The fifth-seeded and 12th-ranked Cougars end their season with a 13-12 record.
 
Pepperdine, the MPSF's regular-season champion, will be trying to add its first MPSF Tournament title since 2008.
 
BIG WAVES

• Senior outside hitter David Wieczorek (Chicago, Ill./Loyola Academy) had a match-high 16 kills on .520 hitting (16-3-25). He also had three digs.
• Senior opposite Michael Wexter (New Lenox, Ill./Lincoln-Way West HS) added 12 kills while hitting a career-best .579 (12-1-19). He had a pair of service aces and six digs.
• Senior outside hitter Kaleb Denmark (Redlands, Calif./Arrowhead Christian Academy) contributed seven kills, four digs and an ace.
• Sophomore setter Robert Mullahey (Manhattan Beach, Calif./Mira Costa HS) handed out 32 assists and posted five digs.
• Senior middle blocker Max Chamberlain (Burbank, Calif./John Burroughs HS) had three kills, three aces, two digs and two blocks.

MATCH STATS

• PEPP hitting: .392 overall (.393 set one, .174 set two, .609 set three)
• BYU hitting: .217 overall (.200 set one, .136 set two, .318 set three)
• Service Aces: PEPP 7, BYU 2
• Digs: PEPP 24, BYU 18
• Blocks: PEPP 2.0, BYU 5.0
• BYU was led by Davide Gardini and Gabi Garcia Fernandez, who had 10 kills apiece.

PLAY BY PLAY
 
The Waves never trailed in the first set. At 11-10, Pepperdine went on a 5-1 run that included a kill by Wexter and an ace by Denmark. At 17-14, the Waves ran off five straight points, which included a pair of Wieczorek kills and two Cougar attack errors. Kevin Vaz ended the set at 25-17 with a kill.
 
BYU's only lead of the entire match came early in the second set when the Cougars scored the first three points to go up 3-0. But the Waves evened it up at 4-4, and went ahead 6-4 after a BYU hitting error and a Chamberlain ace. The Waves took a couple of sizeable leads at 14-9 and 18-13, through the Cougars would tighten the score up late, getting within a point at 23-22 and 24-23, though Wexter ended the second set with a kill.
 
The Waves made it clear that they wanted to make it a short night, jumping out to a 4-1 lead in the third set. They repeatedly scored off their serve, going ahead at scores of 10-6, 13-8, 16-9 and 19-10, the nine-point advantage coming after back-to-back Chamberlain service aces. The Cougars got no closer than five points the rest of the way. Pepperdine had its best hitting set of the night at .609 (16-2-23).
 
UP NEXT
 
Saturday's championship match will start in Firestone Fieldhouse at 7 p.m. Third-seeded USC defeated second-seeded UCLA in four sets in the second semifinal on Thursday night.
 
The NCAA Tournament selection show will air on NCAA.com at 10 a.m. on Sunday.