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PROVO -- The No. 4 BYU men's volleyball team (10-6, 8-5 MPSF) recorded its best hitting percentage this season, snapping No. 1 Pepperdine's 8-game winning streak with a 30-28, 25-30, 30-27, 30-18 victory in the Smith Fieldhouse on Friday.

"It's great to be back at home," said head coach Shawn Patchell. "It seems like it's been forever. Pepperdine is the best offensive team in the country so this was a great win for our team."

The Cougars are now 5-5 when they play against teams ranked in the top 10.

Sophomore Rob Stowell led all players with 22 kills while teammate Reed Chilton led the way with 58 assists. Andrew Stewart also led all players with his 12 digs on the night. Russell Lavaja recorded a career-high .714 hitting percentage with 11 kills and only one error.

The Cougars saw their second-highest attendance this season with 4,168 fans.

Sets one, two and three were close back-and-forth matchups with a total of 30 tied scores, 12 of them coming in the third set.

The Waves’ largest lead of the second set came at the very end of the match with a 20-26 lead. The Cougars played back to cut the lead, but wouldn’t be able to come closer than four points as BYU fell 25-30.

"We read the ball and setter better and made adjustments after that second set," Patchell said. "We were patient and slowed them down. Serving aggressively gave us the chance to block."

The third set saw the Cougars holding the lead for six points before the Waves took the lead at 24-23. BYU brought it back for the set's 12th tie score and then again took the lead before getting the final 30-27 win.

BYU dominated the fourth set as it went on a 5-0 run to start, after tying it 4-4, and would never let the Waves back any closer as it took the set victory and overall match.

The Cougars will continue the series tomorrow at 7 p.m. in the Fieldhouse.

Volleyball Box Score
                            The Automated ScoreBook
                 #1 PEP vs #4 BYU (Mar 05, 2010 at Provo, Utah)
   PEP                    |     ATTACK      |SET| SERVE |SRV|DEF|  BLOCK |GEN
## Name                 SP|  K   E  TA   PCT|  A| SA  SE| RE|DIG|BS BA BE|BHE|POINTS
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1  Tyler Jaynes........  4|  9   4  19  .263|  0|  0   0|  0|  1| 0  2  1|  0|  10.0
2  Rodnei Santos.......  4| 11   2  17  .529|  1|  0   3|  0|  1| 0  4  1|  0|  13.0
5  Cory Riecks.........  4| 17   5  29  .414|  0|  0   2|  0|  5| 0  0  0|  0|  17.0
9  J.D. Schleppenbach..  4| 12   8  30  .133|  0|  1   5|  0|  7| 0  4  0|  0|  15.0
10 Kasey Crider........  4|  2   1   5  .200| 59|  2   4|  0|  2| 0  4  1|  0|   6.0
12 Maurice Torres......  4| 11   7  21  .190|  0|  0   5|  0|  8| 0  0  0|  0|  11.0
4  Matt Pollock........  1|  1   0   2  .500|  0|  0   0|  0|  0| 0  0  0|  0|   1.0
14 Sean Grubbs.........  4|  0   0   0  .000|  1|  0   0|  0|  2| 0  0  0|  0|   0.0
16 Trevor Van Uden.....  1|  0   0   0  .000|  0|  0   0|  0|  0| 0  0  0|  0|   0.0
19 Kyle Luongo.........  3|  0   0   0  .000|  0|  0   0|  0|  0| 0  0  0|  0|   0.0
21 Brent Schirripa.....  2|  1   0   1 1.000|  0|  0   0|  0|  1| 0  0  0|  0|   1.0
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
   Totals..............  4| 64  27 124  .298| 61|  3  19|  0| 27| 0 14  3|  0|  74.0
 TEAM ATTACK PER SET                                            TOTAL TEAM BLOCKS: 7.0
 Set   K  E  TA   Pct Sideout Pct
   1  16  6  28  .357  22-29  75%   SET SCORES                1  2  3  4  TEAM RECORDS
   2  19  5  29  .483  20-26  76%   PEP................. (1) 28 30 27 18  9-5, 8-4 MPSF
   3  14  7  37  .189  20-29  68%   BYU................. (3) 30 25 30 30  10-6, 8-5 MPSF
   4  15  9  30  .200  17-30  56%
   BYU                    |     ATTACK      |SET| SERVE |SRV|DEF|  BLOCK |GEN
## Name                 SP|  K   E  TA   PCT|  A| SA  SE| RE|DIG|BS BA BE|BHE|POINTS
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
3  CHILTON, Reed.......  4|  3   0   5  .600| 58|  0   1|  0|  1| 0  1  0|  0|   3.5
5  LAVAJA, Russell.....  4| 11   1  14  .714|  0|  0   2|  0|  1| 0  6  1|  0|  14.0
11 SAGERS, Kevin.......  4| 11   6  21  .238|  0|  0   5|  0|  2| 0  3  0|  0|  12.5
13 STOWELL, Robb.......  4| 22   6  35  .457|  0|  0   6|  0|  4| 1  3  0|  0|  24.5
15 STEWART, Andrew.....  4| 15   2  26  .500|  2|  0   0|  0| 12| 0  2  1|  0|  16.0
17 TAVANA, Futi........  4|  7   2  14  .357|  1|  0   3|  0|  1| 1  5  0|  0|  10.5
1  TUTTLE, Kent........  2|  0   0   2  .000|  0|  0   1|  0|  0| 0  1  0|  0|   0.5
4  SILVA, Joel.........  4|  0   0   0  .000|  0|  0   0|  3|  5| 0  0  0|  0|   0.0
7  ROBINSON, Jeff......  2|  0   0   1  .000|  0|  0   0|  0|  0| 0  1  0|  0|   0.5
8  KAULIAKAMOA, Joe....  1|  0   0   0  .000|  0|  0   0|  0|  0| 0  0  0|  0|   0.0
10 TAYLOR, Mat.........  1|  0   0   0  .000|  0|  0   1|  0|  0| 0  0  0|  0|   0.0
14 PEREZ, Yamil........  2|  0   0   0  .000|  3|  0   0|  0|  1| 0  0  0|  0|   0.0
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
   Totals..............  4| 69  17 118  .441| 64|  0  19|  3| 27| 2 22  2|  0|  82.0
 TEAM ATTACK PER SET                                            TOTAL TEAM BLOCKS: 13.0
 Set   K  E  TA   Pct Sideout Pct
   1  19  4  29  .517  23-29  79%   Site: Provo, Utah (Smith Fieldhouse)
   2  15  7  31  .258  19-29  65%   Date: Mar 05, 2010   Attend: 4168   Time: 2H 21M
   3  19  4  38  .395  21-28  75%   Referees: LES CALLES, MIKE FARRISH, TRENT MANO
   4  16  2  20  .700  17-18  94%
                                         1   2   3   4 Total
                        Tie scores       9   3  15   4    31
                        Lead changes     4   2   6   1    13

The No. 4 BYU men’s volleyball team (9-6, 7-5 MPSF) finally returns home to host No. 1 Pepperdine (9-4, 8-3 MPSF) this weekend at the Smith Fieldhouse. The Cougars have not played in Provo since hosting No. 3 Stanford on Jan 22 & 23. Since then they have spent four weeks on the road.

BYU is tied for sixth-place in the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation standings after dropping two matches at No. 8 Hawai’i. The Cougars now have a 4-5 record against teams ranked in the top 10 this season.

Senior outside hitter J.D. Schleppenbach of Pepperdine earned MPSF co-Player of the Week honors following a career-best performance in last Friday’s 3-1 win over No. 5 Cal State Northridge. The Waves have won eight-straight matches, with Friday’s win marking the 500th in Pepperdine Coach Marv Dunphy’s career.

Series Info

The Waves lead the series against BYU, 26-19, while the Cougars hold an 11-8 advantage in Provo. Pepperdine won the first six matches in the series, dating back to 1990, before the Cougars picked up their first win in 1993. The Waves hold a 7-4 advantage in the series since 2006, while matches in 2009 were split as each team claimed a 3-1 win in Malibu.

Match Coverage

Live stats are available at the BYU men’s volleyball schedule page at www.byucougars.com. Gametracker can be launched by clicking on the link next to the appropriate game on the schedule. Live video is available at byu.tv on Friday and BYU All-Access on Saturday (all-access.cbssports.com).

Coming Off...

BYU is coming off back-to-back losses to No. 8 Hawai’i. The two teams played a hard-fought five-set match on Friday, during which four Cougars recorded double-digit kills. Robb Stowell led the offensive attack with 18 kills. Saturday’s match, originally planned to be played on the island of Maui, was postponed due to tsunami warnings throughout the state. The match was rescheduled for Monday evening. The Warriors claimed the 3-0 win despite BYU outhitting UH .339 to .336.