The Park University Gilbert men's volleyball team dropped a four-set match to UC Merced this evening 3-1 (25-27, 25-17, 25-17, 25-15) in Merced, Calif.

The Buccaneers are now 2-13 overall and 1-9 in conference play. UC Merced is now 8-12, 4-4.

The Buccaneers came out strong in set one holding the lead early in the set by three before the Bobcats worked their way back to tie the contest at 12-all. The two teams then exchanged the lead four times including the Bucs staving off a set point before converting on their second set point to claim the set.

The Bucs posted 16 kills and hit .440 for the set while nine hitting errors by Merced helped their cause.

After committing nine errors in the first set, the Bobcats cleaned up their mistakes and only committed nine errors over the next three sets as they would hit .472 for the rest of the match.

UC Merced would not trail over the final three sets of the match and posted more kills in the final three sets then the Bucs were able to put away for the entire match.

Bobcat outside hitter Chris Morikawa had 28 kills for the match for Merced, a record for a Buc opponent.

Ben Turcinec led the Buccaneer charge with 12 kills and hit .421. David Shafer added 10 kills. Hunter Miller (18) and Jake Burdick (16) combined for 34 of the Bucs 37 assists. Kade Irvine had three blocks.

The Buccaneers finish this three-match road trip with Pacific Union tomorrow night in Angwin, Calif. at 6 p.m. The Buccaneers won a thriller against PUC earlier this month at Bell Bank Park 3-2. The Pioneers are looking for their first win of the season.