A sold-out crowd. Fans screaming on their feet.
UC Santa Barbara’s Robertson Gymnasium was an intimidating
place to play Wednesday night.
Luckily for the Bruins, they will not have to return there again
this season.
As a result of their 30-23, 30-24, 34-32 victory over UCSB on
Wednesday, the UCLA men’s volleyball team clinched home-court
advantage, and will host the Gauchos next Wednesday in the MPSF
play-in match between the two teams.
“It was a huge victory in terms of playoff seeding,”
coach Al Scates said. “We definitely did not want to come
back here and play in front of this crowd.”
In the first two games, the Bruins (19-12, 11-10 MPSF), winners
of seven straight matches, got off to a quick start behind the play
of junior opposite Steve Klosterman and redshirt senior quick
hitter Nick Scheftic.
With the Gauchos starting the majority of their seniors in their
final home match of the season, Klosterman and Sheftic took control
of the net, out-blocking and out-hitting the Gauchos’ front
line.
It was a situation the Bruins knew they had to exploit.
“I saw that they didn’t have their normal starters
in,” Scates said. “So we just went to our big hitters,
and they took over the match.”
Klosterman finished the match with 12 kills and two blocks,
while Sheftic contributed with nine kills and five blocks.
Overall, the Bruins out-hit the Gauchos .372 to .200 as the
Gauchos’ normal starting setter freshman Max Klineman
didn’t enter until the third and final game.
“I was a little surprised he wasn’t in there,”
Scates said. “I guess (coach Ken) Preston wanted to play his
seniors out of respect.”
When Klineman did enter, the Gauchos (13-14, 9-12) gave the
Bruins their toughest rally of the night. They hit a match-high
.256 in the third game and were up 12-9, then 29-28 before the
Bruins finally pulled out the match.
In that third game, seniors Damien Scott and David Russell made
sure the Bruins were not going to lose.
Russell had a kill that brought the Bruins to a 29-29 tie, and
Scott had a pivotal block that gave the Bruins the lead for
good.
“Our seniors took us to the victory tonight,” Scates
said. “They wanted to have that one final game back home at
Pauley.”
That final game will be Wednesday as long as the Bruins remain
in seventh place in the MPSF standings. The only way they could
move up to sixth place would be if they defeat Cal State Northridge
on Friday and Long Beach State loses to both Pacific and Stanford
at home.
“A lot of things would have to go our way,” Scates
said. “But we’re just approaching it as we are going to
play Santa Barbara again next week.”
In the match, the Bruins will certainly face a different team
than the one they saw Wednesday.
The Gauchos’ second-leading hitter Aaron Richman and
outside hitter Bryan Berman will certainly be back in the starting
lineup, and the Gauchos will be facing the Bruins for the second
time in nearly a week.
But to the Bruins on Wednesday, none of that mattered, as they
continued their season-high winning streak and have the chance to
continue their momentum against Cal State Northridge on Friday.