SAN DIEGO – It was a tale of two halves for Academy of Art University volleyball on Wednesday night inside Golden Gymnasium. After fighting tooth-and-nail in the opening set and winning set two, ART U could not overcome late rallies by Point Loma, who ended up winning 3-1. Freshman outside hitter Stine Raben contributed a career-high 19 kills in the defeat.

"I felt that in the first two sets we went out and executed our game plan," said head coach Ray Batalon. "We took advantage of some matchups in the front row and our hitters were in sync with Rachael [Smith]. Deep down, I feel that our team is continuing to get better each and every match."

The closest of the four, set one had the teams exchanging leads throughout. On multiple occasions, PLNU put together three unanswered points, but a no point in the set did either team allow larger than a two-point lead. Up 22-20 on a pair of kills by Raben, the Knights had two errors combine with Sea Lions kills to shift to a 24-22 Point Loma advantage. Despite a service error, PLNU held on to win 25-23.

 Academy of Art controlled the second set early on after an 11-3 run put the Knights up 13-6. Raben and junior outside hitter Melissa Brum worked in tandem to help ART U even the match with a 25-18 victory there. Answering back in kind, Point Loma used a 7-1 surge in the third set, gaining a seven-point advantage that was broadened with a 6-1 push to finish the set up 25-14.

In a now-or-never fourth set, Academy of Art used the blocking tandem of senior setter Rachael Smith and freshman middle blocker Safua Elisaia to cap a 4-0 run then Smith set Elisaia for the 13-12 lead. Elisaia slammed another later on to keep ART U within a point of their opponent, but PLNU proceeded to win five in a row and took the finale 25-21.

"We finally got some production from our middles, particularly Safua," said Batalon. "I thought she played really well tonight. Now if we can get our right side involved a little more, I believe we'll start getting over the hump."

Academy of Art, now 6-10 overall and 2-6 in PacWest play, was led by Raben's career-high 19 kills while Smith added a double-double in the form of 41 assists and 10 digs. Brum posted 15 kills and Elisaia's six kills were packaged with a match-high six block assists. Junior libero Kabrina Speakman led the defense with 23 digs and freshman Alana Lucas contributed 15 digs of her own.

Point Loma breaks their .500 standstill by becoming 9-8 overall and 4-5 in conference play. Heather Leavitt's 16 kills and 14 digs were supported by Kelli LeClair's 13 kills and 14 digs as the Sea Lions hit over .225 in each of the final two sets for the win.

ART U volleyball remains in Southern California for its second stop on this three-part roadtrip. The Knights take on new PacWest Conference member Concordia Irvine on Thursday, Oct. 15 at 7 p.m.

"Concordia will be a tough match tomorrow night," said Batalon. "They've probably got the most experienced coaching staff in the conference, maybe even in college volleyball. Our focus will be to serve tough against them so we can limit their options and somehow find a way to get our other players to score beyond Mel and Stine."