Video: Post-match presser

SAN FRANCISCO – Despite the best efforts from the Dons and backed by a raucous crowd at War Memorial Gym, the San Francisco volleyball team was unable to overtake the No. 10 BYU Cougars on Thursday night.

USF stretched the match to four sets, and was points away from forcing a decisive fifth set, but the 2014 NCAA runners-up found a way to close out the match to hand the Dons (13-1, 0-1 WCC) its first loss of the 2015 campaign. Meanwhile, BYU improved to 11-1 (1-0 WCC) on the year after surviving the tight battle on the Hilltop.

The Dons were led by junior Katarina Pilepic's 19 kills and a game-high 20.5 points, while three others notched double-digit kill tallies on the evening. Oluoma Okaro helped the offense with 11 kills to go along with four blocks, and Jessica Gaffney and Sara Staengle each posted 10-kill outings. Setting duties were split evenly with Kiara McKibben helping on 29 points, and Jurja Vlasic recording the assist on 27 occasions. The Dons' defense was anchored by Kim Gutierrez' 19 digs.

 "It was a great volleyball match overall and both teams played really well and really aggressive, but we fell short" said head coach Gilad Doron. "I'm a little disappointed, but I'm really proud of how we competed today. BYU is very tough to battle but I thought this was the best we've played BYU since I've been here."

Statistically, the Dons and the Cougars were lock-step throughout the night, with each teams finishing with a .258 hitting percentage. The Dons held the advantage in kills (65-47), assists (62-48) and digs (52-44), but the most glaring difference came at the net as the Cougars finished with 15 total team blocks compared to USF's seven.

The BYU tandem of Amy Boswell and Alexa Gray anchored the Cougars both offensively and on the block throughout the match. Boswell, leading the WCC in blocks per set and rating 24th nationally, nearly notched a double-double with 11 kills and nine total blocks. Gray, ranked 22nd in the NCAA in kills per set, added 18 to her tally.

"Boswell – she's an All-American candidate for a reason, and with Alexa Gray there they are really physical in the net," noted Doron. "I thought we did a good job at times. At other times I thought we went away from our game plan a little bit and they made their runs. It's a game of runs and I thought we had one more run in us. Unfortunately we didn't.

Through the four-set match, the score was knotted on 33 occasions with 17 lead changes. In the first set of the match, USF built a 14-11 lead with Gaffney at the service line. Back-to-back kills for Staengle were followed by a smash for Pilepic to force a BYU timeout. The Cougars found a way to scratch back to knot the score at 16, 17, 19 and 20 apiece, but consecutive points for the Dons gave the home team the 22-20 advantage late in the frame. After a timeout, the Cougars scored four straight to take the lead before eventually netting the 25-23 victory.

The second set started with fervor for the Dons as USF build an 8-4 lead after a kill off the hand of Courtney Sabahi. After the Cougars rebounded the tie the frame at 15-15 off the hand of Alexa Gray, the Dons scored six straight with Pilepic at the service line to build a 22-15 lead. The Dons would go on to take the set 25-17 to tie the match heading into halftime.
 
The third and fourth sets went much the same way, with each team finding spurts to keep the see-saw game alive. BYU took the third set by a score of 25-21, and went on to win the fourth 25-22.

"This was a really physical, long match with BYU and you have to exert so much energy, and maybe that was the reason that toward the end we didn't have the legs," said Doron. "I thought the second game we looked really good so we're going to have to look at what we did there and hopefully play more like that. I thought it was a great atmosphere here and a great match for every fan who came to watch volleyball. I thought this was a true top 25 competition in War Memorial Gym – something that we haven't had in a long time."

Next up, USF looks to start a new winning streak as the Dons take on a San Diego on Saturday at 1 p.m.