It’s been 17 years since UCLA women’s volleyball has claimed the Pac-12 championship title, tying with Stanford in 1999.
The No. 8 Bruins (23-5, 14-4 Pac-12) will tie for the title if they can beat the No. 7 Huskies (24-4, 14-4 Pac-12) in Washington on Wednesday, with a chance to win the title outright for the first time since 1993 if they take their next two games.
The Bruins have a major hurdle standing in their way before they can make history.
The Huskies have been consistently at the top of the conference standings this year and shared the Pac-12 title with USC last season.
UCLA will play Washington for the first time Wednesday, following eight consecutive rematches with Pac-12 teams. This is the last regular-season game on the road for the Bruins before they return to host USC.
“It’s always exciting to play a new team,” said senior libero Taylor Formico. “I don’t think we would want to be in any other spot. We want to play the best right now.”
Both the Bruins and the Huskies are going into this game riding five-game winning streaks. Most recently, UCLA triumphed over No. 19 Oregon in four sets on Friday.
[Related: Women’s volleyball takes Oregon Ducks down in four sets]
One aspect to watch will be the serving game on either side of the net.
Although coach Michael Sealy said he hasn’t talked to his team about serving tough in games, he said it’s been something that his players have been doing that has greatly contributed to their success against teams like Stanford and Oregon.
Sealy also said Washington loves to serve tough to keep opponents out of the system.
“They’re a great blocking team if you’re passing poorly. They like to load up and stuff a lot of balls,” Sealy said. “They’re all very, very consistent, which is what their strength is.”
Senior middle blocker Claire Felix said that Washington has been known for being a big blocking team throughout her entire career. She also called the Huskies a great out-of-system team with tall, physical players.
UCLA is getting one of its tallest players back in 6-foot-3 pin hitter Haley Lawless. The redshirt senior missed each of the last two games and was only in uniform for Friday’s match, but Sealy said she was good to go for the Seattle trip and looked great in practice.
Freshman setter Kylie Miller missed practice Monday because she was under the weather, Sealy said. Sophomore Zana Muno, last year’s starting setter, took her place during practice.
“Zana was better today than I’ve ever seen her,” said Sealy, a former setter. “She was fantastic.”
Sealy said that the team is as good as it is because of their focus on playing good volleyball, which means keeping the potential Pac-12 implications at bay.
“We know of the potential noise,” Sealy said. “There will be everyone in the country talking about it, but we’re 20 of those people not talking about it. We’re just going to play and we’re going to get whatever lessons we need moving forward towards the tournament.”