For Cal volleyball, less is definitely more.
Despite having just nine players suit up against Oregon State at Haas Pavilion on Friday night, the Bears (9-7, 3-3 in the Pac-12) swept a 15-player roster in three sets in Oregon State (12-6, 2-4).
After losing starting outside hitter junior Adrienne Gehan to a knee injury, there was a sense of urgency amongst the Cal players. Despite Gehan joining five other injured players on the bench, the Bears showed no signs of vulnerability on Friday.
In the first set, the Bears started strong with a 4-1 lead. The Bears’ .321 hitting percentage in the first set helped them cruise to a 25-14 win.
After a frustrating four-set loss to Oregon on Wednesday, the Bears vented their bottled fury on Oregon State from the start, leading to the crushing first set win.
“(The first set) was some carry-over from Wednesday night,” said head coach Rich Feller. “It made everyone feel like they had more in them, and they came out with the right focus.”
In the second set, the Beavers were even with the Bears at 18 points even. Trailing 22-19, senior Shannon Hawari blocked a shot and killed two right after to give the Bears the second set, 25-19.
Although Oregon State’s senior Camille Saxton led her squad with a whopping 10 kills, the outstanding play of freshman outside hitter Nikki Gombar carried Cal over the Beavers’ dam in the third set.
Gombar’s “jump-float” serve, a technique that prevents the ball from spinning like a knuckleball in baseball, disoriented the Beavers’ defense and gave the Bears an early 4-0 lead to start the final set. From that point on, the Beavers never found their footing and looked frantic trying to formulate some response against the Bears.
Oregon State cut it close when they managed to drop the Bears’ lead to three at 12-9, but the Bears extended their lead to 19-9 when Gombar took the court to serve once again.
Even before the Bears finished the third set with a 25-18 win, the Beavers were looking like a shell of the squad that upset No. 1 Penn State earlier on in the season.
Playing all three sets, Gombar had a career-best six aces, leading the squad to a season-high total of 12 aces.
“(Gombar’s performance) was pretty spectacular,” Feller said. “She’s been consistently one of our best servers as far as aces go. She plays great defense, passes well and gets a couple of great kills.”
By the numbers, the Bears’ .364 hitting percentage trumped the Beavers’ mere .122 percentage. Despite no Bears were in double figures in kills, Hawari and freshman Christina Higgins led the squad with nine and seven respectively.
But all the success on Friday started with Cal’s serves. Serving was a big factor in the win because it gave them the confidence to “feel looser” and focus on other basics like setting and spiking.
“We have to play relaxed,” Feller said. “Our team is so experienced that if we just forget about the outcome great things will happen. It’s still early in the Pac-12 and I’m pretty happy with what we’re seeing right now.”
If anything can relax this squad, it should be the Bears’ first conference shutout of the season.
Andrew Davis covers volleyball. Contact him at [email protected]
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