SANTA BARBARA, Calif. (Jan. 10, 2015) – The Saint Francis U men's volleyball team wrapped up it's West Coast road trip with a 3-0 defeat at the hands of No.12 Long Beach St. University.

SFU opened up the first set with a flash of scoring; after a LBSU service error to open the frame, the Flash rallied off five straight points before Long Beach St. even recorded a point.

While Saint Francis controlled the early part of the set, the 49'ers tied the game up at 15 and then had a 3-0 run to take a 18-15 lead, even after the Flash took a timeout to try and slow down LBSU.

The Beach continued its strong play for the rest of the set finishing off another 3-0 run to win the set 25-21. Leading the attack in the first set for the Flash was Jeff Hogan (Northern Cambria, Pa./Northern Cambria) recording four kills.

Saint Francis was unable to continue the strong play from the first set as LBSU dominated play from the first serve. With the score sitting at 17-7, the Flash took one of it's timeouts to try and regroup. The Beach's lead reached a staggering 13 points before the Flash picked up another three points to finish off it's scoring in the second set.

The third and final set was the most exciting as there were four different lead changes and 11 ties throughout the stanza. Each team went back and forth recording points until the 49'ers went up by two, but not before the Flash stormed back with three unanswered points to reclaim the lead at 8-7. Saint Francis had three different runs of three straight unanswered points.
With the Beach holding a match point play at 24-21, Saint Francis added two more points to put a scare into LBSU, forcing a timeout. But on the next play coming out of the timeout, Long Beach St. finished off the set and the match.

Leading the Flash offensively was Jeremy Gatson, recording nine kills and having a .353 hitting percentage. Mike Marshman (Glenmont, N.Y./Bethlehem Central) was the most efficient hitter for Saint Francis, hitting a .455 clip and recording six kills. Stephen Braswell (Manchester, Pa./Northeastern) also recorded six kills in the match. Adam Kniffen (Latrobe, Pa./Greater Latrobe) recorded a team-high 14 assists as well as the only service ace in the match for the Flash.

Saint Francis falls to 0-4 on the year after the loss to LBSU. The previous two matches with No. 5 UCLA (3-1 (23-25, 25-14, 25-21, 25-22)) and No. 13 California State Northridge (3-0 (25-17, 25-23, 25-23)) will be stated and posted to SFUathletics.com as soon as possible.

The Red Flash return to the court on January, 16 squaring off against IPFW in Fort Wayne, Ind.