LONG BEACH, Calif. \u2014 For the second straight year, Cal Poly ended Long Beach State’s season in the Big West Championship Semifinals, earning a hard-fought 3-1 victory (25-22, 23-25, 25-23, 25-17) on Friday night.<\/p>\n
Fueled by a tenacious team defense and a career-best offensive performance from Chloe Leluge, the Mustangs (24-7, 14-4 Big West) also advanced to the championship final for the second consecutive season.<\/p>\n
The match opened with a tense first set. The Mustangs built an early multi-point lead before a determined Long Beach State squad fought back to tie it late. Ultimately, Cal Poly’s defense made the difference, tallying four total blocks. Charlotte Kelly and Kendall Beshear each contributed three block assists, including the set-winning block that capped a 4-1 run to seal the 25-22 victory.<\/p>\n
Long Beach State responded forcefully in the second set, launching a 7-2 run that forced an early Cal Poly timeout. The Mustangs clawed back, led by a resurgent Annabelle Thalken, and a six-point unanswered streak was part of a larger run that tied the match at 17-apiece. However, Long Beach State answered with its own run to claim the set 25-23 and level the match.<\/p>\n
The third set proved to be the turning point, a back-and-forth affair featuring 12 ties. With the score knotted late, the Mustangs turned to their stars. Leluge, who hit a remarkable .533 for the match, shined alongside Thalken, Emma Fredrick, and Beshear to win the set 25-23 and take a commanding 2-1 lead.<\/p>\n
With their sights set on the final, the Mustangs dominated the fourth set from the start. Beshear’s serving created havoc, landing two consecutive aces in a decisive run. The defense, led by Elif Hurriyet’s 18 digs and a solid blocking effort, stifled Long Beach State’s attack. The match was fittingly clinched on a service error by The Beach, finalizing the 25-17 set victory.<\/p>\n
The win was a full-team effort. Beyond Leluge’s stellar, match-leading 17 kills, Thalken and Fredrick amassed 15 kills each. Beshear contributed a well-rounded stat line of 10 kills, three aces, and three blocks. Bullis orchestrated the offense masterfully with 51 assists, guiding the team to a .302 hitting percentage.<\/p>\n
With the victory, Cal Poly advances to the Big West Championship Final on Saturday at 5 p.m., where the Mustangs will face the No. 1 seed, UC Davis, with an automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament on the line.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LONG BEACH, Calif. \u2014 For the second straight year, Cal Poly ended Long Beach State’s season in the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":74276,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[131,133,132],"class_list":["post-74275","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-long-beach","tag-long-beach","tag-long-beach-headlines","tag-long-beach-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74275","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=74275"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74275\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/74276"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74275"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74275"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74275"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}