Aces are high
Senior outside hitter Mark Williams served a career-high seven
aces last Saturday in only three games against Pacific. The seven
were the second most in school history for aces in a match.
“His serving was really on that night,” UCLA Head
Coach Al Scates said. “His serving had a lot of
velocity.”
Williams is currently third on the all-time list.
Senior middle blocker Adam Naeve, who broke the school record
Feb. 3 against Pepperdine with 10 aces, is second on the list with
170 career aces. He has the rest of the playoffs to serve seven
more aces in order to break the all-time record held by four-time
All-American Brandon Taliaferro (’00).
Tiebreakers galore
After UCLA defeated Pacific Saturday night, the Bruins, Long
Beach State and Hawai’i were left tied with 12-5 records.
When the dust had settled, UCLA emerged with the third seed in the
MPSF Tournament.
The head-to-head record in MPSF match play between the three
teams broke the tie. Since UCLA had split its two matches against
Long Beach State and Hawai’i, the only head-to-head matchup
that was taken into account was a Feb. 15 Long Beach win over
Hawai’i.
With BYU clinching the top seed, Long Beach State took the
second seed. Hawai’i, which had been the top-ranked team in
last week’s USA Today/AVCA Poll, had to settle for the fourth
seed.
Hawai’i officials appealed the seeding, arguing that the
head-to-head records should not be taken into account since the
three teams did not play an equal number of matches against each
other. However, the appeal was rejected.
If the Bruins win their first-round match against No. 6
Stanford, they will play the winner of the No. 2 Long Beach and No.
7 Pepperdine match.
Stanford’s Sweet 16
In the Bruins’ match at Stanford on April 13, Stanford was
accidentally awarded two points on one play to give them a 16-14
lead in the second game. The Bruins argued to no avail, and
ultimately lost the game 30-28.
“I’ve never had it happen before,” Scates
said. “Usually if you go identify the error, they’ll
change it. But in this case, they didn’t.”
League officials told Scates that the error was not
protestable.
MPSF first round
Ticket prices for Saturday’s playoff match have been
changed to $10 for adults and $5 for students. All tickets will be
sold at the door.
Notes compiled by Diamond Leung, Daily Bruin Contributor.