After a trying two weeks on the road, the Bruins are back in Westwood and have snapped a three-game losing streak.
No. 5 UCLA men’s volleyball (10-4, 7-3 Mountain Pacific Sports Federation) will face No. 14 Cal State Northridge (9-5, 2-5) on Wednesday and No. 2 Long Beach State (11-2, 7-1) on Saturday.
This will be the Bruins’ third consecutive week playing a ranked team in both matches. Recently, UCLA fell to No. 3 Brigham Young twice, lost to No. 6 Stanford and then broke its losing streak against No. 9 Pepperdine.
After traveling for two weeks, the team finally has a full week of practice, at home, to work out problems that were on display in its recent losses.
“It’s tough when you’re jumping from match to match without any work in between, said sophomore setter/opposite Micah Ma’a. “You’re going in with pretty much the same skill set that you went into the other games with.”
Coach John Speraw said that an issue for the Bruins has been how they set, who they set and when they set, and that the team needs to continues to improve its serving.
While serving has been a struggle for UCLA, Cal State Northridge’s Dimitar Kalchev is second in the nation with .71 aces per set. In comparison, the Bruins’ best server, senior middle blocker Mitch Stahl, averages .48.
“We just have to have an idea of the way we manage those serves,” Speraw said. “You’re not going to pass a perfect ball and they’re going to get some aces, so how we manage the flow of the game will be important.”
Most recently, Cal State Northridge fell to No. 8 UC Irvine and unranked UC San Diego, two teams UCLA swept earlier this season. However, the Matadors beat the Stanford Cardinal on Feb. 3.
Long Beach State, on the other hand, is riding a four-game win streak, all in straight sets. The 49ers’ Amir Lugo-Rodriguez leads the nation in blocks per set with 1.27 while Josh Tuaniga is second with 11.43 assists per set.
“They’re the best offensive team in the country by a lot, it’s not even close,” Speraw said. “They really don’t have any holes.”
The Bruins will be facing the 49ers in the John Wooden Center, a more intimate venue than the usual Pauley Pavilion.
“There’s a lot of energy in that small gym,” Stahl said.