Carlos Caceres/Staff

The only thing the Cal volleyball team has been able to consistently count on this season has been its inconsistent play.

In this season alone, the Bears have lost in upsets to the likes of UC Davis and Kansas State. Yet, they’ve swept then-No. 16 UCLA and and then-No. 19 Creighton. It’s been the kind of year that has fans scratching their heads.

In Cal’s (10-5, 3-3 Pac-12) latest tilt, they will need to play as consistently as possible to top No. 6 Washington (13-1, 5-1) on Wednesday night in Seattle. It’s not an impossible order, as Cal recently pushed USC, the current top team in the country, to a fifth set in which the Bears were just two points away from victory.

Accomplishing the upset will just depend on which Cal squad shows up.

“It’s a mental thing,” said outside hitter Michelle Neumayr on the team’s inconsistency this season. “It’s obviously easier for us to get pumped up and play against a No. 2 team than it is for Davis. But we’re working on being consistent, and we have to take every team the same way.”

The Bears’ most recent battle with inconsistent play came when the team fell in four sets to Utah on Sunday night. In that match, the Utes’ blockers were able to push the Bears into a season-low hitting percentage of .192 off of 13 blocks.

The Huskies play a similar style of volleyball as the Utes, so if the Bears can learn from the mistakes they made Sunday, they should come into Seattle better prepared. Washington runs a 6-2 offense like that of the Utes, in which two setters are on the court at once. Washington is also a good blocking team, with an average of 2.69 blocks per set, just .13 fewer than Utah.

“We certainly saw the need for having our right-side and left-side blockers help out more when the ball is set to the middle area of the court,” said Cal coach Rich Feller. “If we start going wide, then it’s one-on-one in the middle, and the result against Utah was that their middle blockers had a field day.”

The Bears will need their outside blockers, such as Christina Higgins, to step up in order to stop Washington’s attack. Higgins has recorded .78 blocks per set, the best number for a player who isn’t a middle blocker.

“Our X-factor is Christina and her huge block,” Neumayr said. “Her offense has been awesome as well, but we’ll definitely need her block against Washington.”

Higgins’ play could end up being the key factor as the Cal team tries to get its hitting back on track as well as stop outside hitters such as Krista Vansant, who is averaging 3.85 kills per set for the Huskies.

Doing that is obviously much easier said than done. Earlier this season, the Washington team was ranked No. 1 before a shocking loss to Colorado early in October. Since that loss, the Huskies have dropped only one set in three matches.

For the Bears, overcoming those odds begins in the mind as a mental struggle with their own inconsistency.

Riley McAtee covers volleyball. Contact him at rmcatee@dailycal.org. Follow him on Twitter @riley_mcatee

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Michael Tao/File

The Bears are back and looking for a fight.

After a thrilling road trip, the Cal women’s volleyball team is back at Haas Pavilion this Wednesday to take on Colorado at 7:30 p.m.

The Bears (9-4, 2-2 Pac 12) are coming off a thrilling win against No. 23 UCLA and a tough loss to No. 1 USC this past weekend. Cal proved it can hang with the best of teams when it forced USC to five sets on Sunday and is now looking to brush off the loss against Colorado this week.

“I think without that lapse in the third set (against USC), the match could have gone either way,” said junior Michelle Neumayr. “I think we have a lot of good momentum going in just because of our performance in both matches this weekend.”

Despite this being the first year of play for Neumayr due to injuries, she remains one of the Bears’ most consistent players, along with senior Adrienne Gehan.

As always, Gehan will be a key factor against the Buffaloes (11-3, 3-1 Pac 12), leading the team with an impressive .304 hitting percentage. She ended last weekend with a career-high 22 kills against USC. Gehan will be going head-to-head against Colorado’s Nikki Lindow, who ranks fourth in the Pac-12 for blocks with 1.30 blocks per set.

But the Bears have their own blocking threat on defense with sophomore middle blocker Lara Vukasovic, who had six blocks against UCLA. The successful blocking by Cal was a key factor in their win against the Bruins.

“I think (blocking) is the one factor that fluctuates throughout our play,” said Gehan. “Usually our hitting and passing are pretty consistent, and the games that we block well are the games that we win, versus the game were we don’t and lose.”

The Bears are looking to ride the momentum from their win against UCLA into this Wednesday and keep the energy they had against USC. Their game plan against Colorado will be similar to that of this past weekend: pass-and-serve aggressively.

“The key thing is slowing (Colorado) down and keeping the energy up on our side,” said Neumayr. “I thought we did a great job blocking this weekend, and I don’t see why we can’t continue that on Wednesday night.”

The Buffaloes are coming off of two Pac-12 wins against Washington and UCLA, and Cal is looking to slow down its momentum by utilizing the blocking they have been working on throughout the season. By blocking consistently, the Bears are able to slow down the Colorado offense and give themselves a chance to implement their own game plan.

“They are definitely a hot team that’s really capable of beating good teams, obviously,” Gehan said. “But I think we are too. If we just come out calm and the way we’ve been playing the past two games, then we’ll be good. I like our odds.”

Alicia Fong covers volleyball. Contact her at afong@dailycal.org

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Kelly Fang/Senior Staff

Michelle Neumayr knew something was wrong, but she didn’t want to admit it.

In July 2012, Neumayr was ready to get back on the court. During her entire freshman year, she was forced to sit out with a torn ACL, and after a season spent rehabbing her knee, she was hungry for volleyball.

But something wasn’t right.

In practices, Neumayr’s knee would often buckle. She would fall to the floor, and the team would hold its collective breath.

But she would always pop back up ready to go. With a brace on her knee giving her support, there didn’t seem to be a major problem.

“At the time, we weren’t sure of the significance of her knee buckling,” says Cal coach Rich Feller.

And then one day her knee collapsed under her, and she didn’t immediately get up.

Neumayr tore her meniscus, an injury that usually has a recovery of about six weeks. Though frustrated, she was determined to return to the court by the start of Pac-12 play.

However, an MRI later that day revealed a situation that was even worse: Neumayr had been practicing on a torn ACL. She would need another surgery. And she would miss her second-straight season of volleyball.

Though Neumayr was devastated at the time, she spent that year on the bench much as she had the year prior: studying the game of volleyball and hitting the weight room. Soon, she found those years away from the sport benefited her as an athlete, player and teammate.

A year prior to that injury, Neumayr was playing in the 2011 Junior Olympics in Atlanta. It was her last big tournament before she would begin her college career.

On the second day of the tournament, Neumayr jumped for what should have been a routine kill for the outside hitter, but when she landed, she pivoted awkwardly on her knee. She crumpled to the floor as her knee gave out under her, clutching her leg as she fell. It all happened in a blur. Neumayr expected to have rolled her ankle, but her father knew immediately that the injury was much more devastating.

“The way she fell to the floor, everyone knew,” says Neumayr’s father, Preston. “It was clear she tore her ACL from the way she fell.”

Coaches and players darted toward her, fearing the worst. It wasn’t long before she was whisked away to a medical tent amid a flurry of activity. Her teammates held their breath — no one could be completely sure of the extent of her injury just yet.

An MRI later that day confirmed what trainers already suspected: Neumayr had torn her ACL. She started summer school at Cal just three days later and was walking around Berkeley before she even had surgery on her injured knee. Although she easily could have opted out of summer classes to focus on her recovery, she wanted to get on campus as soon as possible.

“I knew she would be back,” Feller says. He was right, but it would take two years instead of just one.

Fast forward a year from that injury — to July 2012 — and Neumayr was faced with a task nearly as difficult as recovering from her first ACL tear: telling her team she’d torn it again.

When she first heard the result of the MRI, she broke down crying in her mother’s car.

“I didn’t even know how to comfort her,” Lynne, her mother, says. “She couldn’t believe it.”

But by the time Neumayr met her team in the training room, she held herself together to give the players the news that she would have to sit out for another year.

“I just felt sick to my stomach,” says Adrienne Gehan, Neumayr’s teammate and roommate. “You didn’t even have words to say to her, because out of everybody, she was the last person you would want to be hurt.”

Neumayr spent that night at her parents’ house in San Mateo. She returned to Berkeley with a cleared head and a new goal: Put volleyball out of her mind, and focus on getting in the best shape of her life.

That day, she sent her parents this text message: “I’m doing it again. If there’s a chance I can play I’m going to get my knee fixed again.”

Her frustration turned to determination, and she began the long road of recovery for the second time. She was soon one of the strongest and best-conditioned players on the team, a result of showing up to the weight room seven days a week for two hours at a time.

For Neumayr, that wasn’t even the hard part.

“I can handle the whole surgery and rehab process — that wasn’t a doubt in my mind,” she says. “It was not being able to be out there again with players I really like and doing what I love.”

By the time the 2013 season rolled around, she was more than ready to return.

Two years on the bench have made Neumayr a leader.

Neumayr built relationships with players in a way she couldn’t have had she been playing. She was able to give advice as if she were a coach, because she couldn’t take anyone’s starting position.

“No one can ever doubt Michelle if she says you have to work harder,” Feller says. “No one can doubt that that is sincere, and that Michelle knows what that means.”

Those two years also made Neumayr one of the team’s smartest players. Often, new players are amazed by the speed of the game in college compared to high school. But Neumayr watched the game for so long that she was ready to slip right into a starting role in August with no adjustment period needed.

“She’s just sat and watched this level of game for two years from a completely outside perspective,” says Gehan, who also has been held out with injuries at various times in her career. “That can really help a lot. Which is one of the reasons she’s such a smart, all-around player.”

It was no surprise when Feller named Neumayr a team captain before she had even played for Cal. Her discipline through the rehab process won her the respect of her teammates, and her knowledge of the game made her a natural leader.

Before the team’s first match of the season, against Nevada, everyone in the locker room was excited for the freshmen to experience their first college match.

Neumayr’s comment from the back of the room? “Hey guys, it’s my first game, too!”

Everyone laughed. She had made it easy for them to forget she was playing for the first time.

She admits she was nervous during the first serve of that first game. Although her recovery is still not over — coming back from two years off is a long process — she is enjoying being what she calls a “normal” volleyball player again.

“I need to stay patient,” Neumayr says. “But I’m having so much fun just being out there. And I’m definitely cherishing every moment.”

Riley McAtee covers volleyball. Contact him at rmcatee@dailycal.org. Follow him on Twitter @riley_mcatee

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