Tonight at 5:30pm in the Walter Pyramid, No. 1 seed Long Beach State (23-5, 18-4) will take on No. 5 Pepperdine (14-10, 12-10) in the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation Tournament.  In the nightcap, No. 2 BYU (24-4, 18-4) and No. 3 CSU Northridge (23-6, 17-5) will battle to take on the winner of the first game in Saturday’s championship match at 7pm.

After sweeping the MPSF awards for Coach (Alan Knipe) Player (Paul Lotman) and Freshman (Mike Klipsch) of the Year, the Beach is poised to defend its home court and charge into the NCAA Tournament.

Standing in Long Beach’s way are the Waves of Pepperdine, and returning All-American first teamer, Paul Carroll.  The Aussie opposite hitter sat out most of this season with a broken hand.  Long Beach swept the Waves with Carroll in a cast, but he came of the bench in February and carried Pepperdine to a sweep of the Beach, it’s first defeat of the year.

Last week, Pepperdine played their way into this weekend by beating No. 4 UCLA at Pauley Pavilion in four games.  Carroll missed the two games against the Bruins during the regular season, but led the way on Saturday with a match-high 29 kills and 11 digs. Freshman outside hitter Cory Riecks patrols the other side, and is averaging 3.32 kills a game. He had a season-high 24 kills at UCLA in February, and added 22 on Saturday.  He’s reached double-figure kills in 16 matches, as has Carroll.

Long Beach’s Paul Lotman will need to match Riecks and Carroll, and keep the team from repeating its 20 service error performance at Pepperdine in February.  Lotman is averaging a team-best 5.49 kills per game, and hitting .336.  He’s also tallied 20 or more kills in six of the past 11 matches, and 14 times this season.

True freshman Mike Klipsch, who’s leading the nation with 13.8 assists per game, will need to be there for Lotman, Dean Bittner, Dan Alexander and the rest.  He’s guided the Beach to a .324 hitting percentage this season, tied for second in the nation.

If Long Beach is successful tonight, they will likely take on No. 2 BYU on Saturday, who the Beach beat on back to back nights in the ‘Myd in March.