PROVO -- BYU head coach Carl McGown reached another milestone in winning his 200th match in seeing his fourth-ranked men's volleyball team overcome numerous deficits in sweeping No. 5 UC Santa Barbara 33-31, 30-28, 30-22. With the win the Cougars improve to 18-5, 12-5 MPSF, while the loss drops the Gauchos to 15-7, 10-7. McGown's career record now stands at 200-129 (.608).

"To celebrate my 200th win I'm going to take the UCSB coach (Ken Preston) skiing tomorrow," McGown said. "To be quite honest personal milestone's are not important to me. I'm glad we won tonight, and I think we caught this team on an off night, so I'm feeling very fortunate that we came out with this win."

The Cougars outhit the Gauchos .600 to .292 in the first game as the Gaucho block failed to register a block. BYU fell behind by as much as five points, 9-14, after a Luka Slabe service error, but slowly chipped away at the lead. A kill by Luka Slabe tied the game at 18-18. All-American Mike Wall's nine kills and Joaquin Acosta's six kills kept the game close. The two teams traded points, and after a kill by Andy Rivera, UCSB stood at game point 28-29. Acosta then had two consecutive kills to put the Cougars up 31-30 and Mike Wall sealed the game with consecutive kills of his own.

Game two was an even closer affair, and the UCSB block came to life outblocking the Cougars 6-1. After trading points to tie at 20-20, the Cougars slowly ceded control to the Gauchos, falling behind 25-28. After a BYU timeout, the Cougars stormed back, going on a 5-0 run, powered by kills from Wall, Carlos Moreno and Acosta. Moreno clinched the game with a floating serve that deflected off a Gaucho player for an ace.

Up 2-0, BYU took complete control of the third game, stretching its lead to as many as nine (17-9). The Cougars held UCSB to 12 kills and a .069 hitting percentage.

For the match the Cougars compiled 57 kills on 93 swings to hit .452, while the Gauchos were held to 47 kills on 96 swings and a .292 attack percentage.

BYU had three players with double-digit kills. Acosta had a match-high 16 kills while hitting .423, Wall compiled 15 kills (.444) and Slabe registered 10 kills (.400). Rafael Paal hit a match-high .583 in racking up eight kills in 12 attempts with only one error.

The Gauchos did not have a player register double-digit kills. Rivera led UCSB with nine kills while hitting .471.

The Cougars will play the Gauchos again Friday in the Smith Fieldhouse. The match is scheduled for 7 p.m.

--BYU--

BYU Cougars Volleyball 2001/2002
        UC Santa Barbara vs BYU Cougars (Mar 28, 2002 at BYU PROVO UTAH)
    UC Santa Barbara       |     ATTACK      |SET| SERVE |SRV|DEF|  BLOCK |GEN
 ## Name                 GP|  K   E  TA   PCT|  A| SA  SE| RE|DIG|BS BA BE|BHE
 -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 4  GALANG, Britt.......  3|  1   0   2  .500| 42|  0   0|  0|  1| 0  1  0|  0
 8  KOSKE, Ben..........  3|  6   5  13  .077|  0|  1   2|  0|  5| 0  1  1|  0
 9  ZEGARRA, Jan Carlos.  3|  7   7  17  .000|  0|  1   1|  1|  4| 0  2  0|  0
 17 RIVERA, Andy........  3|  9   1  17  .471|  1|  0   3|  0|  3| 1  3  1|  0
 25 KENNEDY, Michael....  3|  7   0  13  .538|  0|  0   1|  0|  0| 1  1  3|  0
 33 ADAMS, Justin.......  3|  8   1  18  .389|  1|  0   3|  0|  0| 0  5  0|  0
 5  LERNERT, Alex.......  3|  8   3  12  .417|  0|  0   1|  0|  1| 1  1  0|  0
 15 BUSAM, Keith........  3|  0   2   2-1.000|  0|  0   2|  0|  2| 0  1  0|  0
 19 MANSFIELD, Aaron....  3|  0   0   0  .000|  1|  0   0|  1|  2| 0  0  0|  0
 22 BENNGTSSON, Anders..  2|  1   0   2  .500|  0|  0   0|  0|  0| 0  1  0|  0
 -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Totals..............  3| 47  19  96  .292| 45|  2  13|  2| 18| 3 16  5|  0
 TEAM ATTACK PER GAME                               TOTAL TEAM BLOCKS: 11.0
 Game  K  E  TA   Pct
   1  20  5  38  .395   GAME SCORES           1  2  3  TEAM RECORDS
   2  15  4  29  .379   UC Santa Barbara.... 31 28 22  15-7 ; 10-7  ;MPFS
   3  12 10  29  .069   BYU Cougars......... 33 30 30  18-5 ; 12-5  ;MPFS
    BYU Cougars            |     ATTACK      |SET| SERVE |SRV|DEF|  BLOCK |GEN
 ## Name                 GP|  K   E  TA   PCT|  A| SA  SE| RE|DIG|BS BA BE|BHE
 -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 2  WALL, Mike..........  3| 15   3  27  .444|  1|  0   1|  0|  5| 0  0  0|  0
 4  ACOSTA, Joaquin.....  3| 16   5  26  .423|  0|  0   1|  0|  5| 0  3  1|  0
 6  GORNY, Chris........  3|  4   1   7  .429|  0|  0   3|  0|  2| 0  2  0|  0
 11 MORENO, Carlos......  3|  4   1   6  .500| 47|  2   2|  0|  4| 1  2  0|  3
 17 PESSOA, Fernando....  3|  0   0   0  .000|  1|  0   0|  1|  2| 0  0  0|  0
 18 SLABE, Luka.........  3| 10   4  15  .400|  0|  0   4|  0|  4| 0  1  0|  0
 1  WILTON, Mike........  1|  0   0   0  .000|  0|  0   0|  0|  1| 0  0  0|  0
 7  MAYOL, Jaime........  2|  0   0   0  .000|  0|  0   0|  0|  0| 0  0  0|  0
 9  PAAL, Rafael........  3|  8   1  12  .583|  2|  0   3|  1|  3| 0  3  3|  0
 12 ALLEMAN, Jonathan...  2|  0   0   0  .000|  0|  0   0|  0|  0| 0  0  0|  0
 -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Totals..............  3| 57  15  93  .452| 51|  2  14|  2| 26| 1 11  4|  3
 TEAM ATTACK PER GAME                               TOTAL TEAM BLOCKS: 6.5
 Game  K  E  TA   Pct
   1  24  3  35  .600   Site: BYU PROVO UTAH (SMITH FIELD HOUSE)
   2  18  7  34  .324   Date: Mar 28, 2002   Attend: 1328   Time: 1H 45M
   3  15  5  24  .417   Referees: TOM GIVEN, LES CALLES, DJM;MA;MRC;STB;RM;BA

Provo, Utah (March 26, 2002) -- Having won six straight matches, including a pair of 3-0 victories over ninth-ranked Cal State Northridge last weekend, the fourth-ranked BYU men's volleyball team will take on No. 5 UC Santa Barbara in the final two home matches of the season. To make things more interesting, the Cougars have just six league matches remaining and will need a pair of victories this weekend to keep their title hopes alive.

"UC Santa Barbara is a tough team; they're a lot like us," BYU head coach Carl McGown said. "They are a small team, but very athletic. I think what you're going to see is a lot of explosive volleyball this weekend. We're just looking to improve and maybe get some momentum for a run at the playoffs. This is a really important weekend for us, and we're hoping to get the fans out and help us out."

Currently in fourth place in the MPSF with an 11-5 record, the Cougars play host to fifth-ranked UC Santa Barbara (14-6, 10-6) on Thursday and Friday in the Smith Fieldhouse. Both matches are scheduled to begin at 7 p.m. (MST). A win on Thursday would give the Cougars 12 league wins and secure a spot in the 2002 post-season MPSF Tournament. While UCLA, Pepperdine and Hawaii have already clinched a spot, the race for the regular-season champion has yet to be determined. The top four seeds will host first-round tournament action on Saturday, April 20.

While the Cougars hold a slim lead over Stanford (11-6) for fourth place, UC Santa Barbara is just one game behind BYU at 10-6 in league play. The Cougars are just one game behind Hawaii, who have yet to host both BYU and UCLA. UCLA is in second with a 14-2 mark, while Pepperdine currently leads the MPSF with a 15-2 record. After this week's matches, BYU will travel to UC San Diego and Hawaii to round out the 2002 schedule.