UCLA men’s volleyball faced a top-five team and a sub-.500 squad this week, and the Bruins took care of business with both.
No. 7 UCLA (13-7, 8-6 Mountain Pacific Sports Federation) swept unranked Harvard (6-8, 3-4 Eastern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association) in Pauley Pavilion on Saturday, after taking down No. 5 Lewis on Wednesday in four sets.
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“We had a rough patch toward the middle of the season, but now we’re back on our toes and ready to go,” said junior opposite Christian Hessenaeur. “We haven’t been a super disciplined team, so we just need to have focus in games, and I thought we were able to do that tonight.”
The Bruins had no problem establishing an early lead in set one, consistently leading by eight to 10 points. UCLA reached the 20-point mark before the Crimson even made it into double digits.
Senior middle blocker Mitch Stahl led the team in serving with three aces. The veteran hitter finished with a .800 hitting percentage and four kills in his second game back after recovering from an injury.
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The Bruins finished off the first set 25-11. Junior outside hitter Jake Arnitz doubled Harvard’s three total team kills with six of his own, and UCLA outhit the Crimson .615 to .143 in set one.
“We’re never expecting that. We’re working hard in practice, and it’s showing out here on the court,” said sophomore libero Davis Gillett. “We’ve been focusing a lot on defense and staying balanced. They played well, but we just did our job tonight.”
Harvard brought things to within one in set two, 8-7, but its hopes of nabbing a lead were soon discouraged.
The Bruins applied heavy pressure on the Crimson with their serves, finishing with eight aces in the second set alone and a season-high total of 13. Five different Bruins notched at least two aces.
“If we can keep getting some of those automatic points from the service line, it’ll help us a lot,” said coach John Speraw. “There’s a lot of points there that we’ve had to figure out other ways to get.”
Speraw said he thought last year’s team had been better with their serving production. Sophomore setter/opposite Micah Ma’a set a school record last season with 58 service aces, but has been out recently with a back injury.
Ma’a has been running the team’s 6-2 offense alongside senior setter Hagen Smith this season, but has sat the past two games out. Speraw said that Ma’a’s return to the court was a matter of health, much like his other starters who have suffered injuries in recent weeks.
The Crimson improved to 12 kills in set two, as the second set ended 25-17.
Hessenauer led UCLA’s offense with nine kills, followed by sophomore outside hitter Dylan Missry’s eight. Five Bruins notched at least five kills in a well-distributed offensive performance by Smith, who finished the night with 39 assists.
Smith fired his second service ace to finish the game off 25-17 in the final set.
Speraw said that he was particularly happy to see the quality of play and focus that his team showed, especially against two teams with very different skill levels. Regardless of the competition, he said there were zero changes in their focus.
“That’s really hard to do,” Speraw said. “I’m super happy with that, and it shows me that this team still wants it. They still want to get better and they believe that they can.”