The University of the Fraser Valley men's volleyball team found their mojo midway through the third set, but it was too little, too late as the Capilano Blues prevailed at the Envision Financial Athletic Centre on Friday.

The visiting Blues took the first two sets in decisive fashion (25-18 and 25-17), and opened a 20-13 lead in the third before the Cascades mounted an epic comeback that fell just short as Capilano closed it out 25-23.

The Blues boosted their record to 6-3, good for fourth place in the PACWEST, while the Cascades fell to 0-9. The two teams tangle again on Saturday at the EFAC (7 p.m., pacwestbc.tv).

"The first two sets were not good," UFV head coach Kyle Donen noted. "We struggled to execute, for the most part. I thought we passed the ball decently well, we just struggled to get the ball to go down. We had a lot of attempts for very few points, and we couldn't sustain any consistency. And we struggled to slow them down until that third set, really.

"I think the fight was better in the third, at least towards the end. We need a little more of that, and we need to be able to do that for an entire set, an entire match. We showed we can play, we just need to show that from point one to point 25."

The Cascades' encouraging third-set stretch was ignited by a five-point service run from Josh Fefchak, with rookies Jackson Obst and Shubdeep Wander providing great energy and solid defensive play. Ultimately, though, the Blues were able to stave off UFV's long-odds rally.

Ben Friesen racked up a game-high 10 kills for the Cascades, Fefchak registered five kills and two aces, and Matt Whittall had four kills. The attacking struggles Donen alluded to manifested in a .091 hitting percentage for UFV; Capilano was at .347.

Blues setter Simon Friesen – Ben's twin brother – had 23 assists to go with a trio of kills, and Jacob Hopkins and Markus Bratsberg had seven kills apiece.