Unlike last season, when every match was a must-win in order to make the conference playoffs, this season the UCLA men’s volleyball team had a little breathing room. With their seeding and first-round playoff opponent already locked up going into Friday night’s match, the Bruins didn’t have the do-or-die pressure to beat Mountain Pacific Sports Federation bottom-dweller UC San Diego Tritons in their final regular season match of the year.
The No. 4 Bruins could not lose, having beaten the Tritons 44 times in a row.
UCLA soundly defeated UCSD 30-26, 30-24, 30-28. UCLA raised its record to 19-10 overall and ended with a 13-9 record in conference play. Still, the Bruins will remain the No. 5 seed going into the MPSF quarterfinals Saturday against No. 4 seed UC Santa Barbara.
“We just wanted to win and not to lose momentum,” said coach Al Scates, whose team now has a five-game winning streak.
The Bruins are hoping the momentum they built over their past five matches, including the latest against UCSD, will propel them to double that win count by May 5 at the NCAA Championships.
It is crunch time for the 19-time NCAA champions, and Scates has his team playing its best at the most crucial time of the season.
“We’re doing everything better,” he said. “I think we can go all the way. We’re not favored to go all the way, but I think we can.”
Scates’ confidence was clearly demonstrated by his players’ performances Friday. Steve Klosterman led the team as opposite with 17 kills, followed by middle blocker Jamie Diefenbach’s 13. Team captain Paul George also hit a phenomenal 0.467 against a scrappy UCSD defense.
But Scates admitted that there is still more to improve on, namely blocking. The Bruins out-blocked the Tritons by a slim margin of 9.5-6 Friday, and he felt the team needs to do much better in the matches to come. However, the teams UCLA will encounter in the playoffs will not be like UCSD, whose tallest outside hitter is listed at 6 feet 3 inches.
“We could’ve blocked better tonight,” Scates said. “Their best hitter was Will Ehrman, who is probably about 5-10 but a real fast arm swing. It was a different group out here. We’ll see some 6-7 guys (in the playoffs).”
Should blocking be crucial in the upcoming days to come, UCLA better hope that its wall at the net is on its A-game, because beginning Saturday in the quarterfinals, there is no more room for error.
“We need five more wins to be champions,” Scates said. “We cannot lose.”