Last night, #17 UC San Diego fell at home to #6 BYU in four sets. It was a valiant effort too considering that their star opposite Tanner Syftestad came off the bench ‘after missing the previous two days of practice due to illness’ according to the UCSD match recap.
Syftestad still played in all four sets and led the team 15 kills as he hit .407 to go with five digs and three blocks. He was the only player in double-figures for kills on the Tritons.
Even though he still posted high totals, Syftestad was still limited in playing time which was showed by his total attacks (27). That number was only two more than Luke La Mont (five kills) and four more than Wyatt Harrison (six kills). Compare that to his season numbers, where Syftestad has 402 attempts and no other player is above 155, and you can see that his opportunities were more limited. In fact, Syftestad only appeared in the first as a serving substitute and a rotational hitter late in the second before he did his work in starting the third and fourth.
It was the first time in 2018 that Syftestad had come off the bench. In total for the year he leads the country in kills per set (4.95) and is doing so at a high .343 clip to go with 57 digs (1.46 per set), 39 blocks (1.0 per set) and 16 aces (0.41 per set).
Sitting at 7-4, UCSD will next get Concordia Irvine later today on the road. It’ll be interesting to see if Syftestad is limited at all once again with the same illness. After that though the team has a week in between its next match to get him healthy.
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