UC Riverside
0-1,0-0Big West
Alabama
2-0,0-0SEC
| Team | 1 | 2 | 3 | Final F |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| UC Riverside | 10 | 17 | 10 | 0 |
| Alabama | 25 | 25 | 25 | 3 |
Women’s Volleyball Drops Season Opener
8/29/2026 4:28:00 PM | Women's Volleyball
Brewer spearheads offense at Alabama
TUSCALOOSA, Ala. - UC Riverside (0-1, 0-0 Big West) opened the 2026 season and year two of the Branden Higa era on Saturday at Foster Auditorium with a 3-0 defeat at Alabama (2-0, 0-0 SEC).
UCR fell behind quickly in set one and couldn't recover after being overpowered by Alabama. Andrea Brewer logged a pair of kills in the opener while Zeynep Belgutay, Malia Tanksley, Juliette D'Eliseo, and Evelyn Hendrix also joined the stat sheet. UC Riverside spread its 11 digs across six players.
Hendrix and Tanksley teamed up on the block to close an early deficit to one in set two. The Highlanders continued fighting and pulled to within four on D'Eliseo's second kill of the match, with Maya Barron providing the assist. Belgutay spearheaded a 3-0 scoring run late in the set with a kill and a block assist to her credit.
Elena Kasavica took the lead on another 3-0 run in set three with an assist and her first Division I kill, as UCR cut the Tide's lead to 6-4. A 4-2 Highlander run later in the set saw UCR pull to within a point after back-to-back errors from the hosts.
Brewer led the Highlanders with four kills on the day.
UCR concludes its brief trip to the South on Sunday morning with an 11:00 am PT first serve at Samford on ESPN+.
