While UCLA students gear up for their first days of class this week, the women’s volleyball team will be leaving Westwood and flying to the Bay Area.
The Bruins have a competitive week ahead of them, as they face No. 10 California on Thursday and No. 2 Stanford on Friday.
The results from this week’s matchups will have a significant impact on the Pac-10 standings and will set the tone for the beginning of conference play.
If the Bruins are able to get past the hurdle of beating two top-10 teams, they will remain in the upper half of the standings.
The Golden Bears are a team that has been on the rise for the past couple of years. This season, the Bears’ go-to players are senior outside hitter Angie Pressey and sophomore outside hitter Hana Cutura. Pressey and Cutura lead their team offensively in kills.
“Just from watching them, they are playing very, very well right now,” UCLA coach Andy Banachowski said. “Their hitting is very strong, stronger than it’s ever been.”
Banachowski also noted that Cal, as well as Stanford, has a number of tough jump servers. This week in practice, the Bruins have been working on their serve reception in order to prepare for the fast and tough serves they are bound to face in the upcoming days.
After Thursday night’s game against the Bears, the Bruins are scheduled to head over to Palo Alto to face Stanford.
The Cardinal are the team to beat this season as Stanford is the defending Pac-10 champion and currently undefeated.
The Cardinal are also led by a pair of outside hitters in junior Cynthia Barboza and freshman Alix Klineman. The Bruins will see plenty of activity from both Barboza and Klineman, who are still considered offensive weapons when they are hitting from the back row.
“Barboza and Klineman are two of the premier outside hitters and they are very complete players,” Banachowski said.
“We have to just try and limit them. They set a lot of back row balls and make sure that those attackers are available all of the time. We are just hoping to play good defense.”
One of the keys to slowing down the Cardinal is solid blocking. The Bruins have spent time during practice focusing on putting up a strong block.
Senior middle blocker Rachell Johnson, who leads the team in blocks per game, will help the Bruins accomplish their goal.
“We have been working on serve receive and putting up blockers on the outside hitters,” junior setter Nellie Spicer said.
In a conference where any team can beat the other, away games can be especially challenging matches. But the Bruins still see a fair number of UCLA fans in the crowd when they play in the Bay Area.
Junior outside hitters Ali Daley and Kaitlin Sather, as well as sophomore defensive specialist Diana Douglas, all come from Northern California. This trip gives them the chance to play in front of family and friends.
“We always get a crowd of UCLA fans who make the trip north to watch us play,” Spicer said.