Correction: The original headline for this article published Nov. 2 contained an error. The weekend women’s volleyball games were at UCLA, not in Washington.
As November rolls around and Pac-10 play heats up, the UCLA women’s volleyball team knows what kind of competition it’s up against.
Though the teams on the other side of the net might be getting tougher as the year goes on, the Bruins are improving right along with them.
The different outcomes this season between UCLA’s first match against Washington, a team that the Bruins hadn’t beaten since 2006, and their recent win over that same team is an indicator of that improvement.
On Oct. 2, then-No. 12 UCLA lost 3-0 in a road match against then-No. 10 Washington. On Friday, the No. 11 Bruins (17-5, 7-4 Pac-10) ended their losing streak, taking down the No. 7 Huskies (17-5, 6-5) in five sets at Pauley Pavilion.
“Definitely we’ve all gotten better,” junior libero Lainey Gera said after the win over Washington on Friday.
“When it’s early in the Pac-10, everyone’s new and everything. Preseason’s hard but you don’t play teams like (Washington) every night. The Pac-10’s insane so playing teams like that every night makes you better every single time. We still have a lot of room to grow, but (we’re) definitely way better,” Gera said.
Coach Mike Sealy said he felt that the Bruins played better in their second match against the Huskies, regardless of the outcome.
“Even if we had lost this 3-0, but they were well-fought, hard sets, then that’s an improvement,” Sealy said. “So it didn’t have to be winning, I was proud of us regardless because I think we battled pretty well.”
After starting out 3-4 in conference play, the Bruins have won four straight matches and are fourth in the Pac-10. UCLA seems to be peaking at the right time, going into a weekend in which they will have to take on Stanford, the Pac-10’s No. 2 team, and California, the top team in the conference.
“I think it definitely builds our confidence going 4-0,” sophomore opposite Rachael Kidder said. “Those are going to be two really tough matches, but we’re planning on getting two wins, so hopefully we can just carry this momentum and hard work over to that weekend.”
UCLA’s first Cal-Stanford weekend of the season marked the beginning of the team’s recent success. After getting swept by the Bears on Oct. 8, the Bruins had their biggest win of the year, beating the then-No. 1 Cardinal in five sets on Oct. 9.
It was UCLA’s first of six wins in its last seven games.
Though the Bruins haven’t been on the short end of a set score for a while, assistant coach Dan Conners said victories aren’t the most important thing.
“The winning right now isn’t necessarily our focus “¦ it’s the “˜Are we playing better?'” Conners said. “And I think we’ve kind of proven ourselves with the wins that we are playing better, and I think that’s going to give us some nice confidence going into Stanford and Cal this weekend.”
Big wins ““ like the ones against Stanford and Washington ““ are confidence boosters, but the Bruins contest that they must stay hungry.
“It does give you confidence, but it can’t make you cocky,” Gera said. “You’ve got to still battle each point, you can’t just think, “˜Oh, we’ve beat (the) top team in the nation and then we beat another top-10 team,’ that you can just cruise. You’ve just got to keep going after it.”