Facing their toughest opponent of the season, the UCLA
women’s volleyball team is ready for the challenge ahead of
them. When the No. 22 Bruins (9-5, 2-3 Pac-10) match up against No.
2 Washington (14-0, 5-0) tonight in Seattle, they will be playing a
team that seems unstoppable. Undefeated in 14 matches, the Huskies
have swept their opponents 12 times. Washington leads the nation
with a .382 hitting percentage and currently features the
country’s best setter in Courtney Thompson, who is averaging
15.2 set assists per game. The Huskies also lead the Pac-10 in
aces, kills and opponent hitting percentage, and boast five of the
conference’s top 10 hitters. “We’re expecting to
face a very experienced team,” UCLA coach Andy Banachowski
said. “They’ve got everybody back from last year and
play very comfortably and confidently with each other. It’s
going to be a task to beat them because we’re still at an
infancy stage compared to where they are. They certainly deserve
the ranking that they have.” Last weekend, Washington
followed up a victory over No. 13 Cal by defeating No. 3 Stanford
in Palo Alto, avenging their loss to the Cardinal in last
season’s NCAA Semifinals. The losses by Cal and Stanford make
the prospect of beating Washington a little harder for the Bruins,
since UCLA was easily swept by both teams only a few weeks ago.
“I think the match is going to be tough, especially since
Washington beat Stanford pretty easily in four games,” junior
outside hitter Colby Lyman said. “They’re a really good
team, but we are coming off a great weekend and are excited to play
them.” Despite the fact that Washington has strong players at
every position, including the Sports Imports/AVCA National Player
of the Week Sanja Tomasevic, who had 25 kills, 18 digs and nine
blocks against Cal, the Bruins are confident they will be able to
compete if they just focus on their own performance. “We
can’t let ourselves be overwhelmed by them,”
Banachowski said. “They’re going to play a solid game,
and we just have to play our game as best we can.” In order
for UCLA to have a chance of winning, they will need to repeat the
solid play they showed last weekend in their shutout wins over
Oregon and Oregon State. Of particular importance is the
team’s blocking and serving, which showed strong improvement
last weekend. The Bruins out-blocked their opponents 24 to eight
and averaged 3.5 aces per game, well above their 1.41 aces per game
season average. “We’ve been working on our blocking a
lot because they have a lot of big hitters who can hit really
well,” Lyman said. “We also need to serve especially
well to prevent them from running their offense like they do
normally, and pass well so we can get our offense going.” In
addition to gaining momentum, last weekend’s matches allowed
the Bruins to get vital experience playing together now that all
the starters are back. Lyman returned after missing several matches
with a tibial bone contusion and contributed with nine aces and 22
digs on the weekend. “We’re starting to get a little
bit more of a comfortable feel about where everyone is and what
they’re doing on the court,” Banachowski said. “I
think the players got a good feeling of confidence about the lineup
that we’re in now, and that’s going to help us. If we
can serve and block against Washington like we did last weekend,
we’ll have a chance for an upset.” Knowing that they
are facing a great opponent, the Bruins are excited to see how they
fare against one of the elite teams in the nation. “It should
be fun because our team is finally at a good place, and I’m
really excited,” freshman Kaitlin Sather said. “It
should be a really good matchup. We just need to be really
aggressive and believe in ourselves from the very
beginning.”
QUICK POINTS: The Huskies eliminated the Bruins
last season in the round of eight of the NCAA Tournament. The
Huskies were the No. 1 seed, while the Bruins were the No. 8 seed.
They defeated the Bruins in five games, 27-30, 30-19, 30-28, 24-30,
15-9. The Washington women’s volleyball team no longer lists
the birth dates of their players. The Seattle Times reported a
story earlier in the year stating that Washington All-American
Tomasevic is currently 25 years old, born in 1980. The issue came
up when Tomasevic was granted a waiver by the NCAA for a fourth
year of eligibility, saying that she had enrolled in school late
because of issues out her control. “We know that she is 25
years old,” Banachowski said. “Beyond that, we
don’t know why Washington stopped listing the birth dates of
their players. I am unaware of the rules regarding that
situation.”
With reports from Sagar Parikh, Bruin Sports senior
staff.