University of California, Merced – Steele, Bobcats Shatter Offensive Records in Five-Set Loss to Westcliff

MERCED, Calif. – Ryan Steele broke the program’s single-match record with 61 assists and the University of California, Merced men’s volleyball team pounded out a program record 72 kills, but the Bobcats ultimately fell in five sets to Westcliff University, 2-3 (25-20, 25-27, 25-23, 26-28, 15-17) on Sunday afternoon inside the Joseph Edward Gallo Gymnasium.

Steele is the first ever Bobcat (6-9, 4-4) to go over 60 assists in a match. He also recorded 12 digs to notch his first double-double of the season and the eleventh of his career. Steele, who is already the program’s all-time assists and service aces leader, moved into second place on the all-time digs list Sunday afternoon as he passed Matthew Pelfini and now has 518 total digs in his career.

Chris Morikawa accounted for nearly a third of the Bobcats record-breaking 72 kills, finishing with 23 overall on a .333 hitting percentage. Sunday marked Morikawa’s second 20+ kill effort in the last five matches and with it, the Yorba Linda, Calif., native is now over 200 kills on the year. Morikawa becomes just the second player in program history with 200+ kills in multiple campaign’s. Morikawa, who has accomplished the feat in 2020 and 2022 (2021 was a shortened season), joins the elite company of Cole Smith. Morikawa also had 14 digs against Westcliff to notch his second career double-double. Both his 23 kills and 14 digs were within two of his career-high. 

Trevor Jurlina pounded out a career-high 17 kills while operating at a .314 success rate. The senior has three double figure kill matches in the last six contests. Additionally, Jurlina has hit over .300 in back-to-back matches with at least 12 attempts. Prior to tonight’s career-high, Jurlina’s top mark was 16 kills back on February 24, 2019. 

Jurlina and Steele were just two of six Bobcats with career-high’s in the five-set affair.

Brennan Taylor had a career-high nine kills on a .333 hitting percentage. The freshman also had three blocks, one solo for the second straight day.

Jared Guglielmana had seven kills and a career-high three blocks. 

Freshmen Jozef Lingenfelter and Sebas Moreno each recorded a career-high four service aces.

Zach Brill finished with a season-high 16 digs and six assists. It was his fourth career match with at least 16 digs. No other Bobcat in program history has more than two such matches.

Other individual notables include six digs from Kainoa Ferguson and Kaikoa Soma, three blocks from