When Long Beach State defeated BYU in straight sets on January 23, the 49ers served six aces and had 12 errors. In the national semifinal against the Cougars, Long Beach missed a whopping 19 from behind the line and aced Long Beach only four times as BYU took the 3-1 (25-21, 23-25, 25-19, 25-18) victory.

The 49ers live and die by their freshman outside hitter T.J. DeFalco, who was recently named AVCA Newcomer of the Year. Tonight, DeFalco couldn’t produce the way his team needed him to, claiming seven of those 19 service errors and making nine hitting errors. Setter Josh Tuaniga, also a freshman, went to DeFalco a match-high 47 times, and the former high school teammates connected for 23 kills.

BYU’s sophomore outside hitter Brenden Sander quietly put away a team-high 14 kills with no errors for a .583 percentage. The 2016 First Team All-American also served two aces and collected four digs.

In the second semifinal of the the evening, Ohio State, led by AVCA Coach of the Year Pete Hanson and AVCA Player of the Year Nicolas Szerszen, battled in a grueling back-and-forth five-set match-up with UCLA, finally coming out on top 22-25, 25-22, 25-21, 20-25, 18-16. Fittingly, sophomore Szerszen served an ace for the final point.

Neither team could find a rhythm early, with UCLA bombing 26 service errors for the match and OSU collecting 20 of their own. The Buckeyes’ Miles Johnson also took a few sets to get rolling, but ended the night as the match’s kills leader with 20.

Ohio State and BYU will meet in the national championship match Saturday at 8 p.m. ET. ESPN2 will air the match live.