The lights went out at the Stan Sheriff Center about 90 minutes before the start of Saturday night’s USA Volleyball Cup.

They never quite came back on for Team USA.

A revamped Chinese lineup, led by outside hitter Ting Zhu, who had 13 kills, lit up the top-ranked Americans with solid serving and an even better block in a 25-21, 25-23, 25-12 sweep. It was the first loss in nine USAV Cup matches for the U.S. in the three-year history of the event.

It was quick, just 74 minutes. And it was ugly at the end.

"We pride ourselves on fortitude, being strong the face of adversity, and, being down 2-0, was an opportunity to fight our way back," U.S. coach Karch Kiraly said. "We usually have more grit that we showed.

"We both changed our lineups and their changes made more of a difference. Their service and having No. 2 (Zhu) in the lineup, their best player, really stabilized them. Our serve and serve-receive was weaker and theirs was stronger tonight."

It was quite the reversal from Friday when it was the U.S. that was more aggressive on serve and attack. Third-ranked China adjusted its block to counter the speed of the American outside hitters, particularly taking away the line shots that had been so effective.

The connection between setter Molly Kreklow and her hitters, in particular opposite Karsta Lowe, wasn’t as sharp as Friday. Lowe finished with four kills, 10 fewer than the previous match, and hit 25 percent, nearly 35 percentage points lower than Friday.

Kiraly switched out both middles, had a new starting outside, Megan Hodge Easy, and used Kalani High product Tamari Miyashiro at libero. Having the most success against the Chinese was middle Cursty Jackson, who had a team-high 12 kills.

"We had never seen (Lowe) before and we went over the film this morning," China coach Jenny Lang Ping said. "We were able to make the adjustments.

"The first thing is we played more relaxed tonight. The second was our passing. Without that, we cannot run our offense. I was happy that we played better and that was the important thing."

Both teams expect to continue tweaking their lineups as the Cup moves to California. It continues Tuesday at UC Irvine’s Bren Events Center.

Winning the "friendly" was nice but Lang said it wasn’t that important at this point of the Olympic quad. Qualifying for the Rio Games doesn’t begin until the World Cup in August.

"We both are young and still learning," she said. "The U.S. is a very strong team and we expect them to continue to be stronger."

Team USA had a good shot at evening the match late in Set 2. The Americans used a 3-0 run to take the lead at 22-21, the go-ahead point coming on a cross-court kill by Lowe.

Junjin Yang’s step-out tied it at 22 and China grabbed set point on a net violation and a hitting error by Lowe that just grazed the antenna.

The U.S. held off one set point but not another with China running a quick set to middle Xinyue Yuan to take a 2-0 lead. The Americans never recovered, falling behind in Set 3 8-2 and 18-6.

"It was disappointing, a tough way to end it," Miyashiro said. "But China is a great team. We need to learn from tonight and use that keep improving."