#3 Loyola vs. #1 UC Irvine
NCAA Semifinals, 8 p.m.
Maples Pavilion, Stanford CA

Loyola will face the MPSF regular season and tournament winner, UC Irvine, for a chance to return to the finals. The Anteaters began the season slowly, dropping their first match of the season 3-0 at home to Lewis. West Coast fans would suggest that the loss to Lewis is irrelevant because UCI hadn't yet figured out their lineups and rotations. Coach David Kniffin's crew is led by senior Zack La Cavera, the MPSF Player of the Year, who rates a 3.88 kill average and brings great serving skills. UCI has won their last 10 matches in a row en route to a 28-4 record and #1 ranking. Their current winning streak includes breaking BYU's 2-year long home winning streak (and repeating the feat the very next night) and winning the MPSF tournament at home over Pepperdine.

The Ramblers are fresh off defeating Pfeiffer 3-0 in the play-in match on Tuesday, where they struggled in the second set-- surviving 8 set points to eke out the win. Newly-minted NCAA Player of the Year Thomas Jaeschke showed great leadership and took over when Loyola needed points, but against UC Irvine it will take more than one player to step up. The Ramblers will probably have to do a little better than the 11 service errors made against Pfeiffer against only 3 aces, and the nerves of Loyola's three starting freshmen should be a little more steady with one NCAA match already under their belt.

UC Irvine match notes: http://www.ucirvinesports.com/sports/m- ... 0504or96gn

Loyola press conference preview (video): http://www.loyolaramblers.com/sports/m- ... 15aab.html

Streaming video: http://www.ncaa.com/championship/livepl ... 2015/05/07

1st set to Loyola, 25-22!

2nd set to Loyola!

I believe this was a direct quote from David Kniffen's Dos Equis commercial

Back to the Championship! GO RAMBLERS!

Kniffen has a face that's very easy to hate. Very Eddie Haskellian.

Congrats to the Ramblers for DOMINATING the Anteaters.

Onto the Finals. Rooting for Penn State in the other semi.

You da king. LOL!

The mighty MPSF goes 0-2 against lower-seeded teams, winning just one set.

Awesome! Even better to beat Kniffen!

Go Ramblers! Defend that title!

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Cigarboy sucks!

Loyola looks virtually unstoppable when they're in system. Incredible effort both offensively and defensively. Wow. I can't believe we're one game away from back-to-back National Championships! What a time to be a Rambler!

A fantastic victory! It was much easier than I expected. It looked as if the play-in match on Tuesday really helped the team get over the "jitters." I wonder how Mr. Kniffen is going to vote in the final poll?