After losing four consecutive games, the No. 11 UCLA men’s volleyball team needed a win.
They easily found it against Grand Canyon University Wednesday night.
The Bruins (8-10) had not won a game since Feb. 14 when they traveled to Illinois and beat Loyola Chicago in five sets.
“Finally winning a game; I’d forgotten what it was like,” freshman quick hitter Thomas Amberg said. “It feels good.”
UCLA was able to easily put away the visiting Antelopes in an hour and 15 minutes in straight sets, 30-19, 30-25, 30-21.
Amberg led the way with 18 kills in 22 attempts, hitting for .773. Senior setter Matt Wade contributed 41 assists to the Bruin victory.
“I liked the way our freshmen middles were getting up fast and being available for our setter,” coach Al Scates said. “They were in the right spot and running their routes really good.”
With the team struggling because of injuries, many freshmen have had to step up, including freshman opposite Kyle Caldwell, whom Scates cited as a reason for their strong play.
The game, which was never in doubt, served as an opportunity for Scates to rest his injured players.
“I didn’t suit up two of our players who are injured tonight knowing that we could beat them without Garrett Muagututia and Wes Dunlap,” Scates said. “Both will be available to us in the near future but there was no sense for tonight.”
Junior outside hitter Muagututia has been out for three weeks with a rolled ankle and is still questionable for Friday’s home match against No. 2 UC Irvine. Sophomore quick hitter Dunlap has been out since January with a stress fracture.
After controlling the first set, the Bruins seemed to struggle a bit in the second.
“Our communication was kind of down because after we beat them really well in the first game we kind of laid up a little bit,” Amberg said. “We picked it up after that and we got to put them away.”
The Antelopes had a small run late in the game, closing the gap 20-18, but the Bruins were able to hold onto the lead and win 30-25.
In recent games, however, the UCLA offense has been subpar. Wednesday the Bruins hit as high as .600, but also as low as .259, coming away with a game average of .464.
With highly ranked UCI next up on the schedule, the offense will have to stay steady to pull off an upset.
In order to come away with their biggest win of the season, the Bruins will also have to improve their blocking, since they were out-blocked 6.0 to 3.5 against Grand Canyon.
“I think we will be able to take this game and run with it a little bit,” Amberg said. “We kind of got a rhythm going so we can take that rhythm and put it into Irvine.”