SAN DIEGO - No. 2 seed UC Irvine fell to top-seeded and 39th-ranked UC Santa Barbara, 4-0, in the Big West championship match Sunday at Barnes Tennis Center.
 
The Anteaters (13-8), who defeated the Gauchos 4-2 in last year's final, were looking for their first back-to-back Big West tournament titles since 2010-11, but it was UCSB that came away with its conference-leading 15th championship.
 
UC Santa Barbara (22-3) won two hard-fought doubles matches to take the 1-0 lead. At No. 2, Thomas Smart and Lawee Sherif went back-and-forth with Luka Mrsic/Conrad Brown before the Gauchos pulled away late for the 6-3 victory. Gianluca Brunkow/Pablo Masjuan then edged Matthew Sah/Rithvik Krishna 7-5 to clinch the point on court three.
 
At No. 1, Brandon Park and Noah Zamora, who own a team-best 12-4 dual-match doubles record, came out firing as they went up 2-0 against 80th-ranked Kai Brady/Phillip Jordan. UCSB then pulled even and a seesaw battle ensued. Brady/Jordan held a narrow 5-4 advantage when the match was abandoned.
 
UC Santa Barbara carried the momentum into singles play, winning in straight sets at Nos. 5, 1 and 6 to claim the title.
 
At the fourth position, Krishna took the opening set over Lucca Liu in a tiebreaker, 7-6 (6). Zamora (No. 2) and Park (No. 3) were also up in the second set after dropping the first on their respective courts when the match was clinched.

UC Irvine, which won a share of its sixth Big West regular-season title, was making its 10th overall appearance in the finals of the conference tournament.