It was more of the same for the UCLA men’s volleyball team on Monday night in John Wooden Center. After sweeping the University of Alberta this past weekend, UCLA swept the Laval University Red and Gold in similar fashion to close out its Canadian exhibition matches.
The Bruins featured a much different starting lineup against the Red and Gold, including three players who didn’t appear against Alberta. Sophomore setter Hagen Smith played instead of junior Steve O’Dell and had 34 assists. Freshman outside hitter Oliver Martin struggled at first with five hitting errors in the first set before settling in and only committing one more.
Sophomore outside hitter Jake Reeves, the third new starter, provided much of the Bruin offense. In his 16 attempts, he had 11 kills and played in all three sets.
“I think going into the season, it’s really important to get confidence,” Reeves said. “Knowing that we can win and beat up on teams and sweep them is really crucial – especially as a young team we need that going into the season. We didn’t have the fall preseason so having these two matches under our belts is really helpful.”
After battling back-and-forth in the first set to win 25-22, the Bruins took sets two and three by scores of 25-20 and 25-19. Like Saturday, the team’s hitting percentage steadily rose, improving from .207 in the first set to .367 by the end of the match. 16 total serving errors by Laval also aided UCLA.
“We’ve been throwing around different lineups in practice everyday, so it’s hard to cement one system with a specific group of guys,” Smith said. “We started to click more towards the second game.”
Laval University, a school in Quebec City, Quebec, is currently in the midst of a three-game California exhibition trip. The Red and Gold will play Cal State University, Northridge tomorrow night.
“It’s usually not very easy (to play an unfamiliar team), but it does force us to work on our adaptability and to learn as quickly as we can to see if we can make adjustments defensively,” said coach John Speraw. “Tonight we did in some cases and not in others. It’ll give us an opportunity to go back, watch some video and learn from it.”
The team has been able to mix and match its lineups because of an even depth it possesses, said Speraw. He added that the coaches expect to solidify a starting lineup soon. The Bruins will start regular season play this Friday in the UC Santa Barbara asics Invitational, playing both Saint Francis University and Indiana University – Purdue University Fort Wayne that day.