As if it even needed to be said, middle blocker Katie Camp is pumped for Friday’s USC match.
“I mean obviously, you know, it’s a big game,” the sophomore middle blocker said. “Everyone is always pumped for it.”
With the UCLA women’s volleyball team hosting the Trojans Friday night, the team is excited. Hosting their cross-town rivals in only the second week of conference play and coming off a home-opening split, Friday’s match may be more vital that just fighting for bragging rights.
The No. 16 Bruins (12-5, 1-1 Pac-10), just a week into Pac-10 play, have seen some of the tough competition their conference offers. Eight Pac-10 teams, including No. 13 USC, are ranked among the AVCA top-25.
Camp said that despite their four-set upset of then-No. 9 California, the Bruins are focused on this week’s competition rather than on their victory.
“Now we see that every week is a challenge in the Pac-10,” she said. “It’s a great volleyball conference. Yeah, we just beat Cal but we’ve got to go beat another great team this weekend.”
Earlier in the season, after a road upset of then-No. 5 Nebraska on Sept. 13, the Bruins had a two-week-long nosedive in the rankings.
The Bruins fell to three unranked teams ““ Cal State Fullerton, Long Beach State and Arizona State ““ in their post-Nebraska slump.
“I think that our team has grown up a lot since the post-Nebraska feelings,” said Camp regarding her team’s growth since then. “After Nebraska we had our heads a little big. … So it’s not like our heads are huge after Cal. We’re excited about it but we’ve got to get better in the gym this week.”
Coach Andy Banachowski added that the Bruins were not perfect this past weekend; the loss to Stanford still exposed weaknesses in the Bruins’ lineup.
“We recognize the fact that we played well against Cal and won … but we also lost against Stanford on Friday night,” he said. “It wasn’t like we were quite on cloud nine like we were (after Nebraska), but we realized how tough the Pac-10 is going to be and how hard we have to work.”
The women’s volleyball team, Banachowski and Camp both said, has matured significantly since their early-season upset of the Cornhuskers.
“I think were a little more grounded ever since we realized we fell flat on our face after feeling so good about ourselves right after Nebraska,” he said. “We came into the gym (Tuesday) and we were able to get in a good hard practice.”
Cooking up the offense
After the setter-outside hitter duo of Nellie Spicer and Ali Daley graduated last year, the Bruin offense was wide open for new blood on both the setting and attacking sides.
With freshman setter Lauren Cook taking the sets duties for the women’s volleyball team since the start of the season, as well as a number of new hitters gaining playing time, the team has noticed a change in set distribution.
Redshirt senior opposite Kaitlin Sather, who sat out last season with a shoulder injury, returned this year, adding a new hitting option. Freshman outside hitter Bojana Todorovic has emerged as a significant player in the Bruin offense while junior outside hitter Dicey McGraw is making a more significant impact this season.
The sophomore middle blocking corps of Camp, Amanda Gil and Sara Sage have also continued their dominance this season.
“We’re very diverse in the fact that we don’t have one player that contributes,” Camp said. “We have multiple, actually everyone on the court at the same time can do great things to help our team win.”
Four Bruins average over two kills per set this season while five players have received over 200 attacking opportunities this season.
“Lauren is very good at mixing up her sets and I think it’s good for making (opposing) teams confused,” Camp said.
Banachowski said having a new setter for the first time in four years adds a different dimension to the Bruin offense as it helps them mask their attack.
“Certainly there are different dynamics with the new setter coming in,” he said. “It helps us with the fact that we have good distribution. It makes us harder to read and harder to stack up against.”
Men’s team comes out to support
As they usually do, the UCLA men’s volleyball team arrived at Friday’s match in wild costumes. Friday’s attire: lumberjacks, showing they wanted to chop down the Stanford tree.
Camp said their intensity and taunting of Stanford helped the women’s squad establish early-match momentum.