PROVO, Utah — The No. 6 BYU men's volleyball team is set to host No. 15 UC Santa Barbara this weekend, with the Cougars looking to end a four-game slide.
COUGARS (6-4)
The Cougars dropped one spot to No. 6 in week four of the 2025 AVCA National Collegiate Men's Volleyball Poll. BYU has been ranked in the top-10 since February 6, 2023 for a total of 33 consecutive weeks.
BYU fell in two matches against the No. 4 Hawaii Rainbow Warriors at home in front of two jam-packed crowds of 5,000+. The Cougars dropped a nail-biting five-set thriller on Friday, with BYU failing to capitalize with five match-point opportunities. Hawaii won in four sets on Saturday. Keoni Thiim had a team-high 35 combined kills in the two matches for BYU. Freshman Niko Hales had a career-high eight blocks on Friday, also hitting a perfect game with six kills on six swings.
Thiim leads the NCAA in kills with 160, averaging 3.90 kills per set. He has the sixth-most aces in the NCAA with 19.
GAUCHOS (6-2)
UCSB is coming off of a split in two home matches last week. They swept Concordia University Irvine on Wednesday and fell 3-1 to No. 12 Lewis on Friday.
The Gauchos are led by opposite Geste Bianchi and setter Cole Schobel. The two lead the team in almost all major statistical categories. Bianchi has 20+ kills in four of his last five matches played, including all of the last three. In the two matches last week, he had 20 and 23, respectively, good for 6.14 kills per set. On the year, his 5.50 kills per set leads the country by a significant margin. Schobel leads the team in digs (47) and served five aces against Lewis for a team-leading 11 on the year. His 257 assists also lead the team, good for 10.28 assists per set.
COUGARS VS. GAUCHOS
The last matchups between the two programs came last season at UCSB, with the Cougars picking up 3-1 and 3-0 victories. BYU and UCSB have faced each other every season since BYU started its program in 1990, excluding the conference-only COVID season in 2021. BYU leads the all-time series 48-25.
BROADCAST DETAILS
- Friday, Feb. 7 at 7 p.m. MT live on Big 10 Network +
- Saturday, Feb. 8 at 7 p.m. MT live on Big 10 Network +