THOUSAND OAKS, Calif. — The University of La Verne volleyball team had No. 9 Cal Lutheran on the brink, taking the first two sets, but could not see off the match as it fell, 26-28, 21-25, 26-24, 25-18, 15-9, on Tuesday night at Gilbert Arena.

La Verne got out of the gates slowly and found itself in a 15-9 deficit midway through the first set. But the Leopards forced the Regals into three straight errors to cut the deficit to three points and eventually grabbed the first lead of the game while not allowing Cal Lutheran to string any points together. The Regals forced a deuce, but Brittany Yaxley and Delaney Lynch put down consecutive sets give the first set to La Verne.

The Leopards grabbed the control of the second set late after a back-and-forth start. An Allie Eason kill gave the Regals a 21-19 lead but the Leopards ripped off a 6-1 run punctuated by a Kelsi Robinson kill to take a commanding 2-0 set lead.

It was Cal Lutheran that came up with clutch runs to in the third set to wrestle the momentum away from the Leopards. With the set tied at 15-15, the Regals used a 4-0 run to take a 19-15 lead before forcing La Verne to take a timeout. The Leopards the stemmed the tide with a 3-0 run to get within a point, but the Regals rattled off another 4-0 run to take a 23-19 lead before fending off a late La Verne run to take a 26-24 win.

La Verne got out to a 4-2 lead in the fourth but Cal Lutheran immediately got the lead back with a 3-0 run and did not look back the entire way.

Yaxley led the Leopards with 13 kills and Lynch was right behind with 12. Destinee Sales had 11 and Robinson also reached double digits with 10.

Tiffany Mancuso and Madison Hickey dished out 24 and 22 assists, respectively, and Kristen Sanchez had a team-high 13 digs.

Cal Lutheran's Michelle Lawrence had 21 kills and 17 digs to lead all players.

The Leopards fall to 4-2 overall and 0-1 in the SCIAC. Cal Lutheran improves to 8-1 and 1-0.