PHOENIX, Arizona – The #8 Pepperdine men's volleyball team settled for a split of its first Mountain Pacific Sports Federation series of the season, as the Waves fell in four sets to #10 Grand Canyon, 25-21, 26-24, 19-25, 25-13, on Sunday afternoon.
 
The Waves (6-4, 1-1) beat the Lopes (7-6, 1-1) in four sets on Friday, but hit just .208 today and couldn't pull off the road sweep.
 
BIG WAVES

• Sophomore opposite Jacob Steele (Trabuco Canyon, Calif./El Toro HS) had a team-high 14 kills on .545 hitting (14-2-22) along with five digs.
• Graduate outside hitter Spencer Wickens (Irondequoit, N.Y./McQuaid Jesuit HS) had eight kills and two digs.
• Graduate opposite Jaylen Jasper (Annapolis, Md./Stanford) added eight kills, three digs and three blocks.
• Sophomore middle blocker Andersen Fuller (Manlius, N.Y./Fayetteville-Manlius HS) had a career-high seven kills on .700 hitting (7-0-10) along with four blocks.
• Sophomore setter Bryce Dvorak (Newport Beach, Calif./Corona del Mar HS) had 37 assists, five digs and three aces.

PLAY BY PLAY
 
The Waves only led at 1-0 in set one, as GCU scored the next four points. Pepperdine tied it at nine on a Dvorak service ace, but the Lopes went on another 4-0 run. Pepperdine eventually got back within one point at 19-18 after two aces by Dvorak and a kill by Steele, but GCU scored the next two points, then went on to win by four.
 
Pepperdine built a 17-14 lead in the second set after a Steele ace, but couldn't make it last. GCU came back immediately with a 5-1 run. Tied at 20, GCU scored three straight. At 24-21 the Waves faced three set points but fought all of them off to tie the set at 24. However, GCU went up 2-0 with back-to-back kills.
 
The Waves jumped out to a 5-1 lead in the third set and didn't let up to extend the match. The lead went to six at 13-7 after a block by Jasper and Wilmot. GCU got no closer than three points the rest of the way. At 22-18, the Waves got kills from Wickens and Jasper, and a point later won the set on a GCU service error. Defensively, the Waves held the Lopes to negative-.042 hitting in the set.
 
GCU quickly halted the Waves' momentum, taking leads of 4-0, 7-1, 9-2 and 13-3 in the fourth set. The Waves strung together consecutive points only twice in the set and finished with five kills and five errors.
 
MATCH STATS 

• PEPP hitting: .208 overall (.156 set one, .267 set two, .409 set three, .000 set four)
• GCU hitting: .293 overall (.360 set one, .367 set two, -.042 set three, .500 set four)
• Service Aces: PEPP 5, GCU 4
• Digs: PEPP 27, GCU 35
• Blocks: PEPP 10.0, GCU 9.0
• Grand Canyon was led by Camden Gianni's 18 kills.

UP NEXT
 
The Waves face USC in a two-match MPSF series next week, with a Wednesday (Feb. 23) contest in Firestone Fieldhouse and a Friday (Feb. 25) encounter in the Galen Center. Both matches are at 7 p.m.