Beach volleyball uses loss against LSU to prepare for upcoming road games
Sophomore Lindsey Sparks played the majority of last season for No. 1 UCLA beach volleyball on court five with then-senior Izzy Carry. This year, Sparks has played on courts two, three and four – and has yet to drop a match. (Joy Hong/Daily Bruin senior staff)
Beach volleyball
Texas A&M Corpus Christi
Saturday, 9:15 a.m.
Baton Rouge, LA
No TV info
By Zoe Willoughby
Feb. 28, 2020 10:41 a.m.
Less than two weeks into the season, the Bruins have their first shot at redemption.
No. 1 UCLA beach volleyball (5-1) will travel to Baton Rouge, Louisiana, to face off against Texas A&M Corpus Christi, Tulane (2-0) and No. 2 LSU (3-2) in the Tiger Beach Challenge. This will be the Bruins’ third matchup against the Tigers this season, after their most recent road trip left them with a split record.
Coach Stein Metzger said since that loss to LSU, the team has been working on its ball control leading up to Saturday’s rematch.
“We just weren’t in great situations, and they have big blockers,” Metzger said. “So we want to be in a perfect hitting situation instead of one where we’re jumping sideways or off balance. … They’re a big team, they’re bigger than us so we have to beat them with ball control, good serving and passing.”
Of its past two matchups with UCLA, LSU only had one consistent court without a player taller than one of the Bruins. The Tigers’ last lineup had four starters over 6 feet, with the tallest one standing at 6-foot-4, compared to the Bruins’ tallest at 6-foot-2.
Sophomore Lindsey Sparks also said the Tigers’ height is a reason the team has been working on adjusting its plan going forward.
“I’m excited to play the Tigers,” Sparks said. “We know them a lot better now. The girl that I play against … reaches higher than the antenna, and we’ve adjusted our game plan, so I think I feel a lot more confident going into this next one.”
Junior Lea Monkhouse and senior Lily Justine were moved from court two to court three in their second match of the Outrigger Duke Kahanamoku Beach Classic, a spot they held for both matches against LSU. The pair first defeated the Tigers’ Ashlyn Rasnick-Pope and Toni Rodriguez in three sets but were unable to repeat that when they lost in the tiebreak the second time around.
Justine said their opponents were serving tougher than they were, so serving has been a focus in practice.
“This week especially we’ve been focusing on that tough serving and then being able to side-out well against that serve,” Justine said. “We’re a little bit more of a dynamic team, so we’ve been working on just running our plays and hitting those sidelines of the court, anything. Just moving that blocker around, getting them out of the play basically.”
UCLA’s first loss of the season came 19 matches sooner than it did last year, which Metzger said has given the team an opportunity to identify different areas to build on moving forward for the rest of the season.
“I think it’s an advantage,” Metzger said. “Last year, in fact, we were like, ‘Hey, at some point we need to take a loss here,’ because it helps you take a look at where we can improve, expose certain things that you have an opportunity to work on through the season. We didn’t have that last year. Last year, it didn’t start happening until the end of the season and I thought that was one of the hardest things to overcome.”
This weekend will be the first time UCLA has played against Tulane since the 2017 season, when the Bruins swept the Green Waves 5-0. Over the teams’ last two matchups together, the Bruins are 2-0.
UCLA will take the court at 9:15 a.m. on Saturday.
