Six matches with hardly a friendly face in the crowd.
That’s what the men’s volleyball team has had to
deal with to begin its 2007 season. Tonight will be the
Bruins’ seventh match without seeing the friendly confines of
Pauley Pavilion. The road trips will halt for a month after
tonight’s match in the Matadome when No. 3 UCLA (2-4, 0-3
MPSF) takes on No. 10 Cal State Northridge (2-4, 1-2). The
Bruins’ home opener will finally come next Wednesday when
they host Pepperdine in the first match of a six-match home
stand.
So far, the defending national champions aren’t faring so
well on the road, accumulating a 2-4 record in their travel
bags.
“We really had a tough schedule start,” coach Al
Scates said. “You have to win road games; that’s the
bottom line. We don’t want to wait until we’re 5-10
again before we run our streak. It’s a worse start than last
year.”
Last year, the Bruins got off to one of the slowest starts in
the department’s history ““ going 3-3 in their first six
matches ““ before running the gauntlet to win the NCAA title
in May.
Yet Scates’ main objective in this early part of the
season is for his players to learn from their mistakes. And what
better way to learn than in the toughest environments, away from
home, and against top-ranked opponents. The Bruins hope the
seven-match road swing could be a blessing in disguise for their
developing squad.
“We got to face a lot of good opponents in BYU and
UCI,” opposite Steve Klosterman said. “All our losses
have come to high-fire power teams. They kind of just got away from
us.”
And although the 0-3 conference record is discouraging, both the
coaches and the players will keep on trucking, hoping to pull off
another end-of-season surge like last year’s unbelievable
title run.
“I feel badly about (the losing streak). It’s like
last year. The important thing is we learn by our mistakes. We
played better (against UCSB) than we did against BYU,” Scates
said. “We have to really improve in every match, every
practice. The (players) are training hard, and we (the coaches)
have to keep teaching.”
Scates, a 45-year veteran coach, learned some things himself
this season that may aid his team in getting over its four-match
slump.
“I have to start playing more players,” Scates said.
“I’ve been keeping the starting lineup in, hoping
they’ll get better. I have to start playing (middles) Brett
Perrine, Mark Lovein, and (outside hitter) Dylan Bowermaster so
they can show me what they can do in these tough away matches. I
will be subbing more liberally in the future. I’m not going
to wait around until the end of the match like I’ve been
doing.”
If the Bruins can pull off these early season adjustments, they
just may be able to put an end to their four-match losing streak,
the longest drought seen since 1999.
But UCLA will have a tough road paved for it, as Northridge
defeated the Bruins in five games in a preseason November matchup.
The Matadors exhibit a well-balanced attack, with the offense
spread among its outside hitters Dan Rhodes, Isaac Kneubuhl and
Theo Edwards, all of whom average over three kills per game.
In November, it was the Matadors’ quickness and power that
allowed Northridge to take command of the match. But two months
later, the Bruins are looking to reverse history.