UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. ””mdash; The UCLA men’s
volleyball team so thoroughly dominated its competition Thursday
night that NCAA officials tested the players for
performance-enhancing drugs.
Redshirt senior Damien Scott, redshirt junior Paul George and
freshman Ian Jackson were randomly chosen in the first steroids
test the NCAA has done for men’s volleyball in four
years.
But the Bruins had only adrenaline running through their veins
as they swept Indiana-Purdue Fort Wayne 3-0 in the NCAA semifinals
at Pennsylvania State.
UCLA is scheduled to next face Penn State, which scored an
improbable victory over No. 1 seed UC Irvine in the second match of
the evening during the NCAA finals Saturday.
After a year of struggles, the Bruins (25-12) are finally in a
position to win the national championship that eluded them last
season, which ended in a title-game loss to Pepperdine at Pauley
Pavilion.
Though the Bruins are in the same position as they were last
year, the road to the title match has been quite different.
“We’ve never brought a team to the NCAA Tournament
with such a poor record, but this team has completely reinvented
itself and turned everything around,” UCLA coach Al Scates
said. “This team has worked harder to get here than some of
the teams in the past, and they’ve never lost confidence and
always kept their goal in mind of winning the NCAA
Championship.”
After the departure of six of the seven starters from last
year’s NCAA finals, the Bruins started this season poorly,
compiling a 12-12 record.
UCLA has won 13 straight matches since then, capturing the MPSF
Tournament’s automatic spot in the NCAA Tournament.
With all the momentum in their favor, the Bruins rolled through
IPFW, 30-25, 30-23, 30-28.
With an undefeated, 22-0 record in NCAA semifinal matches, the
Bruins were favored to win after playing as the underdogs for much
of the season.
IPFW still put up a strong fight, determined not to let their
season slip away.
“IPFW really never quit,” Scates said. “They
came back after being down in the third game and showed a lot of
fight and spirit. It was very good competition for us.”
After losing the first game in three of their past four matches,
the Bruins made sure they wouldn’t make the mistake of
starting slowly by jumping out to a 11-7 lead in Game 1.
The early lead failed to last, as the Matadors responded with
four-straight points to tie it at 11-11. The teams traded points
until 16-16, when the Bruins got an advantage that only increased
as they took the first game 30-25.
Their momentum carried over, cruising to a Game 2 victory by
hitting .321 and holding IPFW to .154.
“(Setter Dennis) Gonzalez was completely setting away from
the middle early in the second game, but I reminded him to move the
ball around a little bit more because he was becoming
predictable,” Scates said. “He changed (his play), and
we came back to win.”
The Matadors held UCLA to a .262 hitting percentage in Game 3
but only hit .265 themselves and never took a lead.
The crowd composed mainly of Penn State fans began cheering for
IPFW late in the game, and the Matadors came back from a
seven-point deficit at 18-11 to close the gap to 20-17. But the
Bruins closed out the match strong, defeating IPFW and advancing to
the finals on Scott’s 10th kill of the night.
“(IPFW) is a good blocking team, but we were down there
and ready every time,” sophomore libero Tony Ker said.
“We worked hard the whole time and didn’t let balls
drop.”
The biggest factor in the win last night was the Bruins’
offensive balance.
Gonzalez tried to spread his 40 set assists around the court as
much as possible to get around the strong Matador blocking
presence.
His strategy worked, as all five starting hitters for the Bruins
had at least seven kills and no player tallied more than 14.
The Bruins will now be facing Penn State on its home court for
the national championship.
If the play of the Bruins over the last few weeks is any
indication, they do not mind being considered the underdogs.
“I’m never surprised at UCLA to be playing for the
national title because that is the reason we came here,”
junior opposite Steve Klosterman said. “We’ve prepared
ourselves all year. It’s hard work and determination that got
us here and all the guys really want it.”