Long Beach City College extended its winning streak to 12 matches thanks to a 3-1 Western State Conference win over visiting Moorpark College on Friday night. The 25-19, 25-16, 23-25, 25-17 victory improved the Vikings to 12-2 overall and 5-0 in conference play.
LBCC cruised to easy wins in the first and second sets before running into trouble in the third. Long Beach and Moorpark were tied up 16 times in the third set, including at 22 after a kill by sophomore Joshua Nehls (Warren HS). A bad set by Moorpark's Andrew Hansen on the ensuing play gave the Vikings a 23-22 lead and put them just two points away from picking up a sweep.
But a Long Beach error, followed by an ace by the Raiders' Chris Salas gave them set point before a final Viking attack error denied the sweep by LBCC.
Long Beach regrouped in the fourth to bring home the victory. The Vikings built a 17-10 lead and never looked back.
Once again, the duo of freshman Andrew Pearson (Huntington Beach HS) and Nehls paced the Vikings by combining for 33 of the Vikings' 56 kills in the match. Pearson led all with 18 kills and added two aces while Nehls totaled 15 kills and a match-high 18 digs.
Sophomore Charles Belvin (Lakewood HS) also had a good match off the bench as he totaled 10 kills and three blocks. Freshman setter Gary Trejo (Warren HS) added a match-high 48 assists to go with 10 digs.
Long Beach continues a stretch of four straight home matches on Wednesday (Mar. 23) when the Vikings host Los Angeles Trade-Tech College in a 6 p.m. conference match.
