{"id":500128,"date":"2026-10-18T12:53:26","date_gmt":"2026-10-18T12:53:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/500128\/"},"modified":"2026-10-18T12:53:26","modified_gmt":"2026-10-18T12:53:26","slug":"womens-volleyball-completes-road-sweep-at-sacramento-state","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/500128\/","title":{"rendered":"Women\u2019s Volleyball Completes Road Sweep At Sacramento State"},"content":{"rendered":"

SACRAMENTO, Calif. \u2013 Kyler Birkelbach’s<\/a> best match of the season came at a perfect time, lifting Long Beach State to a 25-18, 25-20, 27-25 road sweep over Sacramento State in a matchup between teams who entered the day tied for second in the Big West women’s volleyball standings.
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\nBirkelbach, a true freshman middle blocker, put away a career-high 12 kills on just 16 attacks for a .750 hitting percentage, the best of the season by any LBSU hitter with at least 12 kills in a match. She also tied her career-high with 7 blocks and added a pair of aces, also a career-best, leading the Beach to a .316 hitting percentage as a team. Birkelbach was at her best in the decisive third set, notching 5 kills on 7 swings to go with 5 blocks in the final set after going for 5 kills on 5 swings in the second set.
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\nLong Beach State (14-4, 6-2 Big West) never trailed in the opening set, sprinting out to a 5-1 lead with aces from Murphy and Birkelbach, a block from Bujnarowska and Sidney Hamaker<\/a>, and Chloe Johnson’s<\/a> first kill of the match. After Sacramento State (10-9, 5-3 Big West) pulled within 8-6, Murphy notched her first kill to spark a 5-0 run which included back-to-back blocks from Kyler Birkelbach<\/a>. Izzy Mahaffey<\/a> served her first ace of the match during the run, and another Hornet attack error concluded the run with the Beach holding a 13-6 edge.
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\nSacramento State scored 4 straight, closing a 18-12 gap to 18-16, but LBSU finished the set by scoring 7 of the final 9 points. Bujnarowska and Maxwell teamed up for consecutive blocks in the middle of the run, pushing the lead to 22-16, and Birkelbach’s second kill set up match point at 24-18. \u00a0The Beach hit .423 in the opening set, notching 12 kills with just 1 error, and Bujnarowska and Maxwell were each involved in 3 of their team’s 5 blocks in the set.
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\nLBSU took an early 5-3 lead in the second set, but the Hornets scored 3 straight to regain the lead, 6-5. After a Kyler Birkelbach<\/a> kill tied the set at 11-11, Sacramento State scored 4 of the next 5 points to take a 15-12 advantage into the media timeout. That’s when Bujnarowska and Birkelbach sparked a 12-3 run, as Bujnarowska recorded 2 blocks and 2 kills during the run while Birkelbach notched consecutive kills to get the Beach to set point at 24-18. A pair of Hornet blocks closed the gap to 24-20, but Kendal Murphy’s<\/a> fifth kill of the match finished off the 25-20 set victory.
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\nThe third set featured 3 lead changes and 12 ties, including ties from 21-21 through 25-25 late in the set. Earlier in the set, Sacramento State jumped out to a 7-4 lead, but Reagan Hope<\/a> and Kyler Birkelbach<\/a> guided Long Beach State back in front. Hope was involved in a pair of blocks during a quick 3-0 run which resulted in the first LBSU lead of the set, 10-9, and Hope’s third kill of the set broke a 10-10 tie. With the score tied again at 13-13, Madi Maxwell’s<\/a> kill preceded 4 consecutive points all scored by Birkelbach. In between a pair of kills, her ninth and tenth of the match, Birkelbach added consecutive blocks with Kendal Murphy<\/a>, and the 5-0 run lifted the Beach to an 18-13 advantage.
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\nThe Hornets responded with a 9-3 run, taking a 22-21 lead late in the set, but Long Beach State kept their composure with kills from Bujnarowska and Maxwell to tie the set at 22-22 and 23-23. Another Maxwell kill on Sacramento State’s set point tied the score at 24-24, and Birkelbach and Murphy teamed up for another block on another Hornet set point to tie the set at 25-25. From there, a bad set gave LBSU a 26-25 edge, and Birkelbach finished off a near-perfect afternoon with the match-clinching kill for the 27-25 win.
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\nLong Beach State’s .316 hitting percentage was its second-highest in a match this season, and it was the first time over .300 since the third match of the season. Junior Madi Maxwell<\/a> put together a solid all-around match while alternating setting duties with an attacking role, finishing with 8 kills, 16 assists, 7 digs, and 5 blocks. Sophomore Kinga Ziolkowska<\/a> kept the offense running at a high level, putting up 17 assists, and Pola Bujnarowska<\/a> tied Birkelbach for the match-high in blocks with 7. Kendal Murphy<\/a> provided 6 kills, 2 aces, and 5 blocks.
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\nVictoria Marthaler led Sacramento State with 16 kills, but she was limited to .082 hitting on 49 attempts. Skyler Gartin added 8 kills and a team-high 4 blocks for the Hornets.
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\nLong Beach State returns home to face Cal State Fullerton on Oct. 23 before visiting Fullerton on Oct. 24. Both matchups will be broadcast live on ESPN+.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SACRAMENTO, Calif. \u2013 Kyler Birkelbach’s best match of the season came at a perfect time, lifting Long Beach…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":500129,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[121,123,122],"class_list":["post-500128","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sacramento","tag-sacramento","tag-sacramento-headlines","tag-sacramento-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/500128","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=500128"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/500128\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/500129"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=500128"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=500128"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=500128"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}