LOS ANGELES, Calif. — One night after their biggest win of the season, the Tigers had one of their worst.

After taking down No. 14 Cal Lutheran University 3-1 on Friday, Oxy was on the other end of the spectrum on Saturday, losing to Whittier College 19-25, 26-24, 25-21, 25-19.

The Tigers (16-8, 8-3) started off strong in Saturday night's SCIAC Spike Out Breast Cancer Awareness game, winning the first set, but not much else went well from there. Whittier took three straight to beat Oxy at Rush Gymnasium.

The Whittier match was part of a Saturday double-header—the first game a 3-0 win over West Coast Baptist—making it the Tiger's third game in 24 hours.

This time though, Oxy was without SCIAC assist leader Jessie Altman (La Jolla, CA), who missed the game after sustaining an injury against Cal Lu.

"The setter is like the quarterback, she sets the tone of the game," Collins said, adding that her team will have to adjust to whoever is setting.  

But the problems weren't limited to the team missing one of their leaders. Oxy was unable to make the necessary defensive adjustments needed to beat Whittier's strong offense.

"Basically, we weren't serving as tough as we usually do, and Whittier was running their offense," Occidental coach Heather Collins, "(Whittier's Alyssa Sialaris) is a very strong hitter, and we weren't able to stop her like last time."

There had obvious miscommunications, leading to net violations and blocking miscalculations.

"The strong outside hitter made us tentative," said Gwynne Davis (Los Gatos, CA) about her team's errors.

Alyssa Mort (Tucson, AZ) had a season high of 14 kills, and Logan Boyer-Hayes (Boulder, CO) had15.

"We had a lot of breakdowns, and failed to make adjustments," Boyer-Hayse said. "There was a lack of focus, and we were unable to stop them."

Oxy has three more conference games before playoffs, all of which will be important if the Tigers want to keep their No. 2 seed in the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference.

The Tigers play the University of La Verne on the road at 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday.