IRVINE, Calif. – UC Irvine dropped a four-set loss to Long Beach State at the Bren Events Center Saturday.

Long Beach State won the first two sets 25-22 and 26-24 before the Anteaters won the third 25-22, but couldn't hold off The Beach in the final frame, 25-21.

Outside hitter Kendra MacDonald led UCI with 10 kills and 10 digs.

The Anteaters dropped their second straight match and go to 14-11 overall and 8-6 in the Big West. Long Beach State, winner of three in a row, improve to 15-9 on the year and 9-5 in the Big West.

INSIDE THE NUMBERS
>UCI had a balanced attack with Katie Smith, Kendra Duffey, Ella Gardiner and Ofure Iselen all recording eight kills. Iselen had a team-best four total blocks (2 solo)
>Defensive specialist Maia Niemen had a career and team-best 14 digs
>Setter Nicole Feliciano tallied 36 set assists, an ace and 12 digs
>Long Beach held the advantage in hitting percentage (.229-.160), blocks (11-8), digs (68-63) and aces (5-4)
>LBSU's Natalie Glenn led all players with 19 kills, hitting .462 (19-1-39)

FIRST SET
>A kill and two UCI attack errors helped LBSU out to an early 3-1 lead
>A kill by Katie Smith and an ace by Amanda Leinbach tied the set at 6-6
>A solo block by Ofure Iselen gave UCI a brief 9-8 lead
>Kendra MacDonald sacrificed her body for a dig that ultimately led to a Smith kill, 17-16
>Two Beach errors, the last a block by Gardiner and Nicole Feliciano gave UCI a 21-19 lead only to watch Long Beach State out-score the Anteaters 6-1 to close out the set, 25-22.  LBSU used four Madi Maxwell kills, a UCI setting error and won on a Maxwell ace.

SECOND SET
>The teams would never get farther than two points apart as they battled back-and-forth
>A pair of Beach kills was followed by a UCI timeout, 24-23
>A LBSU service error tied the set at 24-24 before The Beach had two blocks to win 26-24

THIRD SET
>Smith had two kills and joined Iselen for a block to push UCI out to a 9-5 lead
>Three in a row, two kills by Kendra Duffey and one by Iselen extended the lead to 12-6
>Two Beach attack errors, a kill by Emma Napoleon and an ace by Jensen Campbell made it 16-7
>Two kills and two aces rallied the Beach to 15-20 then after a UCI kill, three more inched LBSU to 18-21
>A kill by Iselen and an ace by Smith put the Anteaters up 23-18
>Long Beach wouldn't go away with a pair of kills before Duffey hit off the block for set point 24-20
>Two Beach blocks made it interesting then Napoleon put down the winner 25-22
>Duffey had five kills in the set

FOURTH SET
>UCI had five attack errors, three on blocks to give LBSU an early 5-1 lead
>A kill by MacDonald and two LBSU attack errors got UCI back in it, 6-9
>The Beach led 16-11 before UCI scored four straight, three that had MacDonald involved. She started the run with a kill then almost went into the drums for a ball that was eventually blocked by Smith for a point. She then passed a ball to Feliciano who dumped it over on a two for a kill, 15-16
>A kill and UCI error helped The Beach to a 20-16 lead and forced a UCI timeout
>A Beach service error was followed by a kill from Smith and an ace by Feliciano that trickled over the net, 19-20
>Two UCI attack errors followed to put LBSU back in control, 22-19
>A kill and UCI attack error ended the match, 25-21

NOTES
>Smith added an ace to increase her team lead to 39
>Smith had five solo blocks over the weekend
>Libero Campbell Jensen posted 12 digs and is ninth all-time in UCI digs with 1,069

UP NEXT
UCI takes its final regular season road trip, heading to UC Santa Barbara on Friday and Cal Poly on Saturday.