Kore Chan/Senior Staff

When men’s water polo captain Collin Smith was just 13 years old, he had already figured out what he wanted to do for the rest of his life.

And it wasn’t just water polo.

In the winter of his eighth-grade year, Smith was selected to attend a holiday training camp at the U.S. Olympic Training Complex in Colorado Springs, Colo. For several days, the young native of San Diego joined other junior athletes from all over the country to learn under some of the nation’s top water polo coaches.

But during that week, Smith wasn’t solely focused on developing his water polo game. Another aspect of the winter camp caught his attention while he was in the pool training.

Despite the many U.S. National Team coaches and past Olympians Smith had the chance to learn from, the young teenager was more so drawn to the people who were working with the athletes and Olympians on the sidelines — people who Smith would later find out were called “biomechanists.” Biomechanists who work specifically in the field of sports analyze athletic movement and performance through the laws of mechanics.

His newfound curiosity sparked a possible career interest at the age of 13 — and since then, he has been set on working in the field of applied biomechanics, a branch of kinesiology focused on the study of body movement, to stay in touch with his love of athletics.

“It just kind of intrigued me,” Smith said. “When I was on that trip, I got to see firsthand how these people were able to work with athletes and stay around the sports world for so long — and that’s what I decided I always wanted to pursue.”

Juggling his passion for water polo and holding down an academically rigorous schedule was no easy task for Smith.

From the get-go, Smith had to rapidly adjust to handling a jam-packed schedule. As a talented freshman recruit, Smith made the men’s water polo travel team straightaway — a feat normally attained by more experienced veteran players. And as a regular sub off the bench, the freshman standout played in all 28 matches that season. Last year, the 6-foot-1 senior attacker led the team in scoring with a high of 61 goals and 31 assists — all the while keeping on track to graduate with a degree in integrative biology.

For Smith, competing in the pool against some of the top squads in the nation is in many ways similar to competing in the classroom. He likens exams to competitive tournaments, grades to trophies — and in developing a similar mentality to handle both major aspects of his life, he is able to succeed in a pool against six other opponents as well as in a lecture hall among a sea of 500 Berkeley students.

“Competing in the pool, you learn on a daily basis how you work best to build off each day,” Smith said. “Especially thinking about taking your undergraduate science classes where everyone’s just competing to get the best grade they can — you just have to focus on yourself, figure out what strategy fits you.”

According to Smith, if there’s one thing he’s learned throughout his past four years at Cal, it’s how to effectively manage his time so that he spends his day doing the things he values. His strategy? Find the sparse half-hour time slots he has in between his classes, weight training, video or pool practice and not squander them.

“Finding that time is hard, but you find these times, because they’re there,” Smith said. “And if something’s important to me, I’ll make time.”

In order to step back from his hectic schedule, Smith has found a home in the Christian community to give himself a breather. About 8 p.m. every Wednesday night, Smith joins about 30 members of the Christian organization Athletes in Action for worship and fellowship at First Presbyterian. For Smith, who comes from a strongly faith-based family, his Wednesday nights provide a sort of solace for him to slow down in the midst of weeks replete with nonstop activity.

“Those Wednesday nights — even though it’s not much — it keeps you there, it keeps you grounded,” Smith said. “It’s nice to have that time to spend with other athletes who share things beyond just being here at the same place.”

Smith knows exactly what he wants to strive for this year and the years following. After he graduates in May, hopefully with a national title under his belt, he will try for a spot on the U.S. national team — perhaps to play in the 2016 Summer Olympics. Whether he establishes a position for himself on the national team, Smith plans to obtain a master’s degree in biomechanics or kinesiology to continue working in the world of athletic sports for as long as he can.

But whatever happens for the ambitious senior in the near future, Smith believes that he has made all the right choices and sacrifices in his four years at Cal — and he wouldn’t have it any other way.

“When I came in, I had a goal to graduate in four years while competing for four years collegiately, and now that I’m looking back, I realize that all the sacrifices I made were all worth it,” Smith said. “Now that I’m here towards the end, having all the pieces come together — the fact that I’ve been able to do everything that I love doing and still feel like I’ve been part of enough, feel like I haven’t missed out — that’s the true reward.

“No matter what happens with our season, I’m absolutely happy with what I’ve been able to accomplish and what I’ve been able to be a part of here.”

Janice Chua covers men’s water polo. Contact her at jchua@dailycal.org.

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Kore Chan/File

By the numbers, the Cal men’s water polo team performed as expected this weekend.

At the SoCal Invitational held in Irvine, Calif., the Bears (11-4) stayed true to their national ranking as the No. 5 squad in the nation — topping all the teams with lower national rankings, but losing out to No. 4 Stanford for the second time this season.

The Cal squad opened up the tournament with a match against No. 13 UC San Diego on Saturday. After dominating the Tritons in the first quarter, the Bears took a 5-1 lead into the second period with a four-point margin that UC San Diego would not be able to recover from. Junior goalie Jon Sibley finished the match with 13 saves, while freshman Thomas Carroll led the Bears in scoring with three goals in the first half.

With a victory in the first bracket of the tournament, Cal went head-to-head against its rivals from across the Bay on Saturday evening for a chance to reach the semifinals of the Invitational. Earlier in the season at the NorCal Invitational on Sept. 22, Cal dropped a 12-10 decision to the Cardinal in the final third-place match of the tournament.

Although Cal led Stanford 9-8 moving into the fourth quarter, three minutes into the period Stanford’s Alex Bowen scored to knot the game at 9-9. Sophomore Colin Mulcahy struck back with a five-meter penalty shot conversion to give the Bears a 10-9 advantage with four minutes left in the game. But then the Cardinal managed to shutout the Bears defensively and score three times in the last few minutes of the game to garner a 12-10 win.

On Saturday, the Bears just could not find their rhythm until the third quarter, but by then it was too late for the Bears to bounce back from Stanford’s strong offensive plays. Despite junior Aleksa Saponjic’s three goals, the Cal squad could not keep up offensively with the Cardinal, falling 14-8 to end play on Saturday.

The next morning, the Bears rebounded from a sluggish start against No. 9 UC Irvine by outscoring the Anteaters 6-3 in the second half of the match. Senior Hunter Gettelfinger contributed two goals during the third period when the Cal team defensively shutout UC Irvine, holding them goalless for the entire eight minutes. The Anteaters eventually fell to the Bears by two points, 11-9.

“I was happy with the team fighting back from a slow start,” said Cal coach Kirk Everist in an interview with calbears.com. “We got great offense from (Farrel) South and (Colin) Mulcahy and the team defense held UC Irvine to just two goals in the final 20 minutes.”

In the fifth-place match up against UC Santa Barbara, the Bears demolished the No. 6 Gauchos, 11-3, to end the weekend tournament with a 3-1 tournament record. The Cal squad kept UCSB’s offensive production to a bare minimum, only allowing the Gauchos at most one goal per quarter.

The Bears finished the SoCal Invitational in fifth place — and still lack a win from a top-five opponent. The squad will next take on UC Santa Barbara for the second time in a row in an MPSF conference match next Saturday.

Janice Chua covers men’s water polo. Contact her at jchua@dailycal.org.

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Kore Chan/File

This past weekend validated the Pacific men’s water polo team as a legitimate contender for the NCAA national championship.

On Saturday, the No. 4 Cal men’s water polo team (8-3, 0-1 MPSF) went head to head against the No. 3 Tigers in a 10:30 a.m. tilt at Spieker Aquatic Complex. After two quarters of back-and-forth scoring, Cal junior Aleksa Saponjic swiped a shot into the right corner of the cage to increase the Bears’ lead to a margin of two, 6-4.

But that was the last time any Bear would score.

The Tigers notched three points in the second half while holding the Cal squad goalless for 14 straight minutes. Pacific (10-1, 2-0 in the MPSF) eventually topped the Bears by a single point, 7-6, for its fourth-straight victory this season.

“We missed a lot of opportunities — we had a lot of good looks on the cage — but their goalie played really well, and we didn’t make them work as hard as we wanted to,” said Cal coach Kirk Everist. “He made some great saves that didn’t allow us to get one goal here, one goal there, and in a one-goal game, those make a big difference.

In the first period, Pacific senior Goran Tomasevic tallied the Tigers’ first point of the game, which would go unanswered by the Bears for the entire first quarter. Cal had several opportunities but was unable to score goals due to the strength of Pacific’s defense, especially in senior goalie Alex Malkis. He would eventually post 15 saves in the game.

“We had really solid looks on the cage and the right guys with their hands on the ball that we wanted to have their hands on the ball, but we just weren’t able to convert really any of them,” Everist said.

Tomasevic scored the Tigers’ second goal to start off the second quarter, but the Bears answered with a swift backhand shot by junior Luka Ivanovic, assisted by sophomore attacker Mitchell Hamilton. Ivanovic’s goal initiated Cal’s second-period comeback, with sophomore Colin Mulcahy notching another goal for the Bears 30 seconds later during an offensive counterattack to tie the game at 2-2.

Senior Hunter Gettelfinger also contributed a goal during the second quarter, and Saponjic rounded out Cal’s first-half production with an impressive lobbed shot into the net.

However, after Saponjic’s goal at the start of the third period, the Tigers managed to stage their own comeback. Pacific’s Balazs Erdelyi — the 2012 collegiate water polo player of the year — knotted the game at 6-6 heading into the fourth quarter.

Malkis later blocked seven of Cal’s shots in the fourth period, shutting down the Bears’ offense, while Tomasevic garnered Pacific’s final goal with a two-meter shot. In the last few minutes of the game, the Tigers stalled during every ball possession they had to run down the shot clock until the end of the match.

“They were a little out of gas, and they definitely didn’t want to come down and set up an offense, have a turnover and have us counter out,” Everist said. “They were taking away our counterattack game and forcing us to score in the front court.”

Despite the close loss, Everist felt the final score met his expectations for the result of the matchup between two of the top teams in the nation.

“We had some opportunities to sneak ahead of them in a few goals, but they made good individual plays,” Everist said. “We knew it was going to be a one-goal game, a tough one for both teams — and it turned out to be just that.”

Janice Chua covers men’s water polo. Contact her at jchua@dailycal.org.

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Tony Zhou/File

If their performance at the Triton Invitational was any indication of how well they will execute this weekend, the Cal men’s water polo team should completely demolish its competition.

At the Aggie Shootout on Saturday, the squad will take on both UC Davis and the University of Redlands for the second time in three weeks in Davis, Calif. The No. 4 Bears will go head to head against host UC Davis at 10 a.m. and will face the University of Redlands in an 11:30 a.m. matchup.

Just a few weeks earlier, from Sept. 7 to 8, the Bears massacred the Bulldogs at the Triton Invitational in their season-opening match at UC San Diego. Led by senior team captain Collin Smith’s four goals, the squad easily defeated its Redlands counterpart, 21-3, in its most lopsided victory this season. The next day, Cal finished off the tournament with a 15-4 domination of the No. 17 Aggies.

By the numbers, this weekend should not prove to be much of a challenge for the top-seeded Cal squad.

However, it will provide the Bears with the perfect platform to adjust to new team rotations without the presence of utility Ayal Keren. The team lost the senior leader to a herniated disc injury just two days prior to the NorCal Invitational last weekend and had no chance to practice without the veteran player leading the second squad rotation.

“We’re looking at using those two games to understand our rotations a little better without Ayal and to fine-tune and get some growth in our younger players,” said Cal coach Kirk Everist. “After UCLA, it became apparent that our younger group didn’t have a rudder — they were young and trying to figure it out on their own — and Ayal gave them that stability.”

According to Everist, the Bears will be looking at sophomore attacker Colin Mulcahy to fill the void Keren’s absence has created. Mulcahy tallied 25 goals in 25 matches played last season and was the leading second on the team, with 29 ejections garnered as a redshirt freshman.

“From a production standpoint dynamic, (Mulcahy) has a lot of energy, and he can definitely fill that role,” Everist said. “He had great production over the weekend and, quite frankly, not enough play time — he really is a No. 6 or 7 player on the team.”

Along with adjusting to Keren’s absence, the Bears will look to improve on defensive positioning issues that prevented them from finishing out their fourth quarters, especially in the UCLA and Stanford matches at the NorCal Invitational.

Cal will continue to make ejection draws one of its main focuses as it moves further along this season, but the team also hopes to gradually improve on gaining advantageous positions on the frontcourt.

“There were kick-outs because we were giving up our position, and we have to see why we were doing that, because it was consistent,” Everist said. “We have to reinforce where we need our defenders to be in order for our help to actually help out.”

The Bears will look to develop their court positioning throughout the season, but for now, the team is just hoping to get through a less challenging weekend after having a chance to train with a reorganized squad.

“(Losing Ayal) was definitely a huge hit for our team, but it gives us something to rally around — it gives us a little more inspiration,” Smith said.

Janice Chua covers men’s water polo. Contact her at jchua@dailycal.org.

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Kore Chan/Senior Staff

The Cal men’s water polo team once again experienced a taste of deja vu at the NorCal Invitational this weekend.

For the third year in a row, the UCLA Bruins thwarted the Cal squad from having a chance to play for the NorCal tournament title, defeating the Bears in a semifinal matchup.

And for the third year in a row, Cal (6-2) lost to the Bruins by a single point, 6-5.

“With all the teams so close, it’s going to be how you finish out the games,” Cal coach Kirk Everist said. “Midway through the fourth quarters of the games, we were right there, and we didn’t finish them out.”

As expected, the No. 4 Cal squad opened the annual NorCal Invitational with a perfect 2-0 record to move to 6-0 in the season on Saturday.

The Bears started the two-day tournament with a dominant win over Air Force, 17-8, in an early morning tilt. Cal’s first-quarter rotations held the Air Force team goalless in the first quarter through strong defensive play, and the Falcons just could not overcome their initial six-point deficit for the rest of the match.

At 6:15 p.m. later that evening, Long Beach State displayed a little more resistance against the Bears but eventually fell, 15-10, to Cal’s strong offensive play. Junior Aleksa Saponjic garnered a match-high six goals against the 49ers, helping the Bears come out with a 4-1 lead after scoring two goals back-to-back in the first quarter.

Cal’s Saturday victories placed the squad in the Sunday morning semifinal matchup, pitting the Bears for the third time in a row against UCLA. However, the Cal team could not hold on to its success, eventually falling to the No. 2 Bruins.

The Bears took an early advantage in the first quarter after redshirt freshman Farrel South scored during a Cal power play. At the start of the second period, however, UCLA notched two quick points back to back, the first of which was scored during a 6-on-4 power play.

Heading into the fourth quarter, the Bruins held a 4-3 lead, before sophomore two-meter man Max Schell tied the game at 4-4 with an inside goal. But UCLA jumped ahead with two swift goals to lead by a margin large enough to put the match out of reach for the Bears.

Saponjic scored a long shot to put Cal within one goal with 27 seconds left in the game, but by then it was too late for the Bears, as the Bruins took possession of the ball until the end of the fourth quarter.

The Bears later fell to No. 5 Stanford in their last match of the tournament, 12-10, to finish the NorCal Invitational in fourth place.

 Although the Cal team once again fell to UCLA in the semifinal matchup and to the Cardinal in the final game of the tournament, Everist found the Bears’ weekend performance to be decent, especially after the loss of utility Ayal Keren two days earlier to injury.

“On the heels of losing a senior leader and extremely impactful player two days before the tournament had an effect on us, but I thought they adjusted pretty well,” Everist said. “I saw a lot of good things, and we got some of our younger players stepping up, so that’s encouraging … but we’re going to need to improve to get to where we want to be.”

Janice Chua covers men’s water polo. Contact her at jchua@dailycal.org.

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Derek Remsburg/Staff

Last season, the Cal men’s water polo team lost one of its major offensive contributors in senior attacker Marin Balarin.

After losing the star center who played at the two-meter mark, the squad needed to find a different alternative to be able to play to its strengths.

After a few weeks of preseason training, the Bears now know exactly how to do just that: focus on their defense and transition to the counterattack.

“That’s one of our biggest strengths as a group,” said senior team captain Collin Smith. “We’re a team based on our defense that leads into that counterattack — it’s something we’ve always known about ourselves.”

This weekend, Cal will have the perfect platform to test where they are as a group to jumpstart the squad’s 2013 season. At the Triton Invitational beginning this Saturday, the Bears will go head-to-head against Redlands at 12:30 p.m. and later host No. 11 UC San Diego at 4:30 p.m. at Triton Pool.

On Sunday morning, the team will take on No. 13 Loyola Marymount at 9:30 a.m., and later No. 17 UC Davis in the afternoon.

Despite facing three of the nation’s top-20 squads, the Bears — who are ranked fourth in both the CWPA and MPSF Preseason Polls — do not seem to be worried.

“I think they’re in a pretty good place,” said Cal coach Kirk Everist. “They’re going to be a little broken down and tired this weekend because of school starting, but we’re looking to go deep into the bench to make sure we’ll get a lot of looks from different players in a competitive environment that’s not us.”

With 17 Bears making the trip down to San Diego, Everist anticipates being able to frequently swap out players on the travel team to find the best seven-player rotations. Among those competing this weekend are senior attacker Smith, who led the Bears with 61 goals and 31 steals last season, and junior Aleksa Saponjic — a bronze medalist who played for the Serbian National Team in the 2012 London Olympics.

Cal’s top two scorers will be joined by senior utility Ayal Keren, as well as a pair of freshman recruits in Chandler Jarrels-Stickney and Thomas Carroll.

For the past week, the Bears have specifically focused on running defensive plays that follow six-on-six and five-on-six match situations. After incorporating several of the defenses they plan on running on game days, the squad practices scoring early in transition.

Heading into their first weekend matches, the Bears are not so much looking at their competition as they are focusing on building a strong defense in front of experienced returning goalies Michael Boggan and Jon Sibley. Once Cal can establish a formidable team defense to push the squad into the offensive counterattack, the Bears are confident that they will find consistent success throughout the season.

“We’re still looking for those two meter men — and they’ll be there, but definitely most of our goals are going to come off of our transition in the counterattack,” Smith said. “This weekend will be a good experience for the newcomers and for us as a whole — we’re looking to start ourselves out on a good note and prepare ourselves for the rest of the season.”

Janice Chua covers men’s tennis. Contact her at jchua@dailycal.org.

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Former Cal track star Alysia Montano narrowly missed the third-place spot in the 800-meter race at Worlds on Sunday.

She was just 0.04 seconds short of garnering bronze at the international championship tournament in Moscow.

Although Montano zoomed around the track in 56.06 over the first 400 meters, the five-time USA champion could not maintain her position in the top three down the home stretch.

Eventually, Brenda Martinez of the United States took third, and defending Olympic champion Mariya Savinoa of Russia and Kenya’s Eunice Sum claimed silver and gold, respectively. Montano finished with a time of 1:57.95 — 0.04 seconds shy of third place and only 0.57 seconds away from first.

The Cal alum, who captured the NCAA 800-meter title for the Bears in 2007, earlier claimed the opening round heat of the 800 meters on Thursday to advance to the semis on Friday.

She later took first in the semifinal heat after racing to the front in the first two laps of the race.

However, Montano’s attempt to become the first U.S. runner to ever medal in the 800 meters ultimately fell short in the Sunday final.

“I just wanted to do what I do in practices,” Montano said after the race. “I have had phenomenal practices. That last 50 meters, I wanted to show everyone what we’ve been doing in practice, but I just didn’t have it. I’m disappointed.”

Team USA set to play gold medal game at Pan American Games Qualifier

After recently garnering impressive victories against Canada and Cuba on Friday and Saturday, the USA women’s national softball team is headed to the championship final on Sunday.

The Eagles took down Canada on Friday, 8-2, and Cuba on Saturday, 5-0, with former Cal alums Lindsey Ziegenhirt and Valerie Arioto producing five of the team’s overall 13 runs in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

Ziegenhirt hit a double and a solo home run for two runs and two RBIs, and Arioto posted a one-for-two performance against Canada with a run and two walks.

On Saturday, Ziegenhirt ended the game zero for two with a run and a walk, and Arioto was again able to post a one-for-two performance with one run, two RBIs and a walk.

In Sunday’s gold-medal game set for 12:30 p.m., Team USA will compete against the winner of the Cuba vs. Canada bronze-medal game.

The post Sports in brief: Aug. 18, 2013 appeared first on The Daily Californian.

“Blowing stuff up is fun, but this is really fun,” said MythBuster Tory Belleci, laughing as he volleyed a tennis ball with Cal men’s tennis coach Peter Wright.

The MythBusters’ Build Team was on campus Tuesday to film part of an episode involving a tennis myth. The crew, which also includes Grant Imahara and Kari Byron, worked closely with Wright as cameras rolled, filming their volleys.

Although the exact nature of the myth that the team is trying to bust cannot be publicly revealed, the crew needed to brush up on their tennis skills to prepare for a later part of the episode.

Director Lauren Williams, who knew Wright growing up in the city of Berkeley, easily reached out to the Cal men’s tennis head coach to secure the location on the UC Berkeley campus. She found it to be an excellent place to film the episode because of both Wright’s expertise and the natural beauty of the campus.

“Cal is incredibly telegenic,” Williams said. “If you go into a track, it’s this Greek-inspired track. If you go onto a court, it’s surrounded by beautiful trees. It’s a campus that’s not only a symbol of higher learning and achievement, but it’s also very visually exciting.”

The MythBusters are based out of San Francisco and found that not only was the Hellman Tennis Complex at Cal the perfect place to film but also that also coach Wright was the perfect person to teach them some tennis basics.

“(Coach Wright) was awesome,” Belleci said after filming. “Back in the shop, we were fumbling with the tennis balls, trying to get the rackets to work and couldn’t do it. We come out here, and in five minutes, we were looking like pros.”

Belleci had the benefit of playing tennis in high school, but Imahara and Byron were not so lucky.

“This was my first time on a tennis court ever,” Byron said.

But through working with Wright and associate coach Tyler Browne, the team was soon hitting well enough for the purposes of the myth.

“I have a grand total of seven hours of instruction in tennis in my life,” Imahara said. “And with (coach Wright’s) help, I look like I’m good at tennis!”

In addition to the great instruction they received, the MythBusters were also excited to work with a local university.

“We always want to foster relations with higher education in the area,” Byron said.

But after almost five hours of filming, the MythBusters hosts hit enough television-worthy volleys to call it a day. Although the later parts of the show could not be revealed to the public, the crew is anticipating performing an experiment comparable to, if not more exciting than, several of the other myths they have busted.

“We’re going to ramp up to something that I don’t even think has been done in real life,” Imahara said. “And it’s gonna be crazy.”

The episode is still a long way from airing, and it could be up to six months or even a year from premiering.

Contact Janice Chua at jchua@dailycal.org. Contact Riley McAtee at rmcatee@dailycal.org

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Cal softball alum Valerie Arioto is stealing all the spotlight recently.

The U.S. women’s national softball team took home its first gold medal of the summer on Friday at the Mayor’s Cup in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

Led by Arioto’s .500 batting average, Team USA garnered gold after finishing the Caribbean tournament with a pristine 4-0 record, claiming wins over Canada, Argentina, Puerto Rico and Cuba.

After each team fought through several days of inclement weather and rain delays, the tournament officials decided to cancel the championship game, awarding the Mayor’s Cup title to No. 1 seed USA by default. As the No. 2 seed, Cuba took silver, and Canada came away with bronze.

But despite an otherwise anticlimatic end to the tournament, Arioto’s powerful presence on the field shone throughout the week as the former Cal softball star aided her team to victory after victory.

Arioto led the offense, batting three for six and collecting a home run, five RBIs and six walks. The one inning in which the star player pitched, Arioto struck out two batters from the circle.

All in all, the Eagles posted an overall impressive performance at the tournament, outscoring opponents 30-8 with the pitching staff combining for a 1.88 ERA.

On Saturday, Arioto continued her domination on the field during the first day of the Pan American Games Qualifier, also held in San Juan.

With a 1-0 score and three runners on at the bottom of the first, Arioto cleared the bases with a home run hit over the fence to produce a 5-0 score.

After Arioto’s grand slam, Team USA notched several runs, one after another, until the team was leading Aruba 11-0 by the end of the first.

The Eagles eventually conquered Aruba after three innings with a 16-0 victory on Saturday. Team USA will continue round-robin play in the Pan American Games against Brazil on Sunday.

Bears show enthusiasm as 2013 Cal volleyball training camp opens

Cal football isn’t the only team that has started training for the fall season.

The Cal volleyball team was out on the court early Saturday morning for its first practice of the 2013 season, with another practice scheduled for that afternoon.

“It was good to see everyone out there,” said Cal coach Rich Feller after practice. “There was lots of enthusiasm, as you would expect … The new kids seem to be fitting in really well and getting used to things. The returning players are setting a good example with the tempo and communication level.”

Cal has six new recruits on its roster, which includes an incoming freshman class ranked in the top 25 in the country. Middle blocker Jenelle Jordan, libero Maddy Kerr and setter Alyssa Jensen will join returning starters like Joan Caloiaro and Adrienne Gehan on the team.

In addition, rising junior Michelle Neumayr will return to play for the Bears after sitting on the sidelines for the past two years. As one of the nation’s most highly recruited players coming out of high school, Neumayr suffered season-ending injuries in her first two years at Cal, preventing her from getting any play time. But the outside hitter is looking to return to the court to make her contributions to the squad.

“It felt great to finally be back out there,” Neumayr said. “At first, there were some jitters. I was nervous and excited. But once I started playing, it was a lot of fun.”

The Bears will open the season with the Cal Molten Classic at Haas Pavilion on Aug. 30.

The post Sports in Brief — August 11, 2013 appeared first on The Daily Californian.

JD Lasica/Courtesy

18-year-old swimming phenom Missy Franklin is quickly taking over as the face of Team USA after superstar Michael Phelps retired last year.

The future Cal women’s swimmer, who burst onto the international swimming scene after posting four gold-medal wins at the 2012 London Olympics, recently garnered the title of most decorated female swimmer in the history of any world championships with six gold medals.

After competing for nearly a week at the Palau Sant Jordi in Barcelona, Spain, Franklin topped off her incredible showing at the 2013 FINA World Championships with a final win in the women’s 400-meter medley relay on Sunday.

Swimming the leadoff leg for Team USA in her last event on Sunday, Franklin gave the United States a slight lead in the backstroke while her teammates, including Cal alums Jessica Hardy and Dana Vollmer, comfortably finished off the race with a winning time of three minutes and 53.23 seconds. Team USA breezed by runner-up Australia by nearly two seconds and third-place Russia by more than three.

Earlier in the competition, Franklin and Cal alumna Natalie Coughlin led Team USA to the gold in the 4×100-meter freestyle relay — narrowly edging out the second-place Australian team by only 0.12 seconds.

After once again claiming gold in the 100 back, the teenage swimming star opted out of the 50-meter backstroke semifinals on the fourth day to focus on the 200 free — one of the events Franklin did not medal in at the 2012 Olympics.

Her decision to concentrate on the 200 free paid off, as the incoming Bear edged world-record holder Federica Pellegrini of Italy to take home her third gold.

“If I had made finals (in the 50 back), it would have also been before the (4×200-free) relay tomorrow night,” Franklin said after choosing to withdraw from the 50 back race. “So with it being right before this and right before the relay, we decided the risks outweighed the rewards for that race … I think I’m happy with the decision to scratch.”

On Thursday night, Australia held the lead in the 4×200-meter freestyle relay for a majority of the race. However, Franklin outswam Team Australia’s Alicia Coutts in the anchor leg of the relay to push the United States to another gold medal victory.

After posting one impressive performance after another, Franklin claimed a championship record time of 2:04.76 to capture the 200 back and add her fifth gold to her increasing medal haul.

All in all, Franklin surpassed the previous female record of five golds at a world meet, set by American Tracy Caulkins in 1978 and Australian Libby Trickett in 2007. The native of Centennial, Colo., also became the fifth swimmer ever to earn as many as six gold medals at a Worlds or an Olympics, joining an exclusive club known only to swimmers like Mark Spitz and Phelps.

“I had some really great races that I’m really proud of, and there’s still a bunch where I have a lot of room to improve,” Franklin said, according to the AP. “So I’m really excited for the next year and the year after that and all the years following those.”

We’ll see you soon at Cal, Missy.

Contact Janice Chua at jchua@dailycal.org.

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