122! Bruins Repeat as Men's Volleyball National Champions!

UCLA defeated Long Beach State, 3-1, to win the school's 122nd NCAA Title and 21st title in Men's Volleyball.

Head coach John Speraw and the Bruins men’s volleyball team won UCLA’s 122nd NCAA title this afternoon! (Photo Credit: @UCLAMVB)

This afternoon, the UCLA men’s volleyball team repeated as the NCAA men’s volleyball national champions by defeating Long Beach State, 3-1, despite having to do it in a building where LBSU had not lost all season.

The Bruins took the lead early in set one when Ethan Champlin quickly ended his scoring drought against the 49ers by scoring the first point of the match. UCLA soon had a 6-3 lead before Long Beach State rallied with five consecutive points to take an 8-6 lead.

But the Bruins were going to roll over today. They tied it back up at 8-8 and again at 9-9 and 14-14. They retook the lead with consecutive errors by LBSU, but Long Beach State tied it up again at 16-16, 17-17 and 18-18.

Champlin’s second kill of the set put the Bruins up, 19-18, and it turned out that it put them up for good in this one as the 49ers were unable to tie the set up again. UCLA finished the first set off by scoring six of the last nine points to take the set 25-21.

Long Beach State won the first point of the second set, but a service error by the 49ers tied the score 1-1 and an LBSU attack error put the Bruins ahead, 2-1. That point put UCLA up for good in the second set as the Bruins didn’t look back and Long Beach State was unable to tie the set up after that. The closest that the 49ers would get was at 3-2.

A four-point run soon gave the Bruins a 7-3 lead. After Long Beach State closed the gap to 7-4, UCLA scored on a Cooper Robinson kill to go up by four again. For the rest of this set, the Bruins were firmly in control and the closest LBSU would get would be three at 14-11. Eventually, UCLA took the second set, 25-20, and they moved just one set away from back-to-back titles.

Set three provided Long Beach State with their only real highlights today. This set was a seesaw battle in which neither team ever led by more than two points. In fact, this one was such a battle that it required extra points. In the end, LBSU took this set by a score of 29-27. That cut UCLA’s lead to one and it left Bruin fans concerned that they could be about to witness a repeat of the 2018 championship match between these schools when Long Beach State came back from a 2-1 deficit at Pauley Pavilion to beat the Bruins for that year’s title.

But the defending champs weren’t done yet.

The fourth set looked a lot like the third set. Again, neither team led by more than two points for most of this one. Indeed, the score was tied 20-20 after 40 points.

At that point, sophomore Zach Rama took the Bruins on his shoulders.

Rama scored two of only three kills he had in the entire match to put UCLA up 22-20. A service error by Merrick McHenry cut the lead to one before Rama picked up his third kill of the match to put the Bruins just two points away from repeating as champs.

An attack error by Long Beach State’s Skyler Varga gave UCLA their second championship point of the afternoon. And, another attack error by Varga ended it for UCLA’s 21st men’s volleyball national championship and NCAA title #122 for the Bruins.

As a result, the beach volleyball team will now begin UCLA’s Quest for 123 tomorrow against crosstown rival Southern Cal at 8 am PT.


Go Bruins! Way to bring home NC #122!

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