SAN FRANCISCO - Fresno Pacific stumbled out of the gate in it season opener, falling straight sets to San Francisco State on Tuesday. The Sunbirds (0-1) had set-point three times in the first set but were unable to finish off the Gators (1-4) who used the momentum from the set one win in extra points to take the next two sets 25-21 each.

"We played a really good first set," said head coach Matt Terra. "I felt like we were really putting it all together but we had some tough breaks down the stretch and that broke us a little bit."

Montana Lowe provided a bright spot for the Sunbirds, finishing with nine kills on .444 hitting. Gabriela Macedo added nine kills and 10 digs. Hannah Butler finished with 24 digs to lead the team defensively. Bissie DenHartog dished out 18 assists while Chelsea Speaks added 12. Sarah McCann was effective on offense with eight kills and added a team-high three blocks.

Chantelle Williams had 10 kills to lead the Gator attack. FPU meanwhile was held to an .094 hitting percentage on the night and made 28 attack errors.

"Heading into some tough matches this week we need to continue to work hard and minimize our errors as best we can," said Terra. There were sparks of potential tonight. Montana has worked really hard and we knew she had this kind of match in her. Sarah had a really good match as well and we have a lot of positives we can build off of from this."

The Sunbirds now travel to Central Washington University for the PacWest/GNAC Challenge where they'll face two ranked opponents on Thursday, #14 Alaska Anchorage and #19 Western Washington.