Santa Clara's sand team will play two weekday matches this week. First, the No. 18 Broncos will travel to Cal on April 15 for a 3 pm match with the Bears and then finish play this week with Saint Mary's on April 17 at 3 pm at Los Gatos High School.
Bronco head sand coach Aaron Mansfield (AM) talked with SantaClaraBroncos.com (SCU) on Wednesday morning prior to travel to Berkley.
SCU: Last weekend the team played down in Hermosa at the USA Volleyball Beach Collegiate Challenge. Can you talk about what the team learned?
AM: It's always good to play competition at that level, but we were a little disappointed with our performance against those teams. We came away from the weekend with not as many wins as we would have liked, but we also had losses to the No. 1, No. 2 and No. 3 ranked teams in the nation with USC, Hawaii and Pepperdine (respectively). We will learn from it and get better. It's always a good experience to travel as a team and continue to build relationships with each other, and play in a different environment in Hermosa.
SCU: When you play teams like USC and Hawaii, who are ranked No. 1 and 2, again this week – what is the difference? Why are they able to beat you?
AM: There is a really small margin for error that they give you. You have to play very clean and we weren't playing our best volleyball against those teams. They really give you very little wiggle room. Their ability to handle and deal with the elements of the wind and still be able to have good contacts on the ball consistently is just better than us.
SCU: This week competition comes at you quick, with Cal on Wednesday and Saint Mary's on Friday. What will you do to get ready for these two matches?
AM: We took Monday off and then we had a good practice yesterday at Los Gatos. The turnaround is quick, but we have worked hard the last couple of days.
SCU: Any changes to the lineup?
AM: We are making some changes. We are going to have Danielle Rottman and Nikki Hess play on our 1s team and Sabrina Clayton and Kirsten Mead play on our 2s team. We are going to move Sarah Vaccaro and Katrina Inch up to our our 3; and we are going to have Mary Shepherd and GiGi Cresto play at our 4. Lacey Maas and Gianna Ruggeroli will play at our 5. With these changes, four of our teams haven't worked together before.
SCU: Why did you decide to switch up pairs?
AM: We feel like it's a great opportunity for our girls to learn how to communicate with someone differently. To learn how to play with a new partner, but our expectations haven't changed. Our goal is to win our next four duels. We practiced yesterday and we were very happy with the way the new teams communicated with one another before, during and after practice. It was really just getting them used to one another. There's going to be some new defense responsibilities with a lot of these teams with Nicki having to block and Kirsten having to play defense, but both of those girls are proficient in those skills, and it shouldn't be much of a struggle to accomplish what we want to accomplish.
SCU: In two weeks, you will transition back indoors for five weeks of indoor practice. What re some things you believe the team will bring back into the gym from sand practice.
AM: Our work capacity continues to increase, so the sand season has been a grind from a time and energy commitment. They have done a tremendous job of showing up every single day, and working hard. Our ability to work hard for longer periods of time is continuing to improve. When we go indoor, we expect nothing less to have a smooth transition from sand to indoor. As far as a workload perspective is concerned, they are going to be able to handle that.
The other thing is that the group has gotten closer. We have traveled together. We have competed together for the past two and a half months, and we are closer as a group. We feel like the unity of our team is about as good as it can be right now going into the five week training session and ultimately getting ready in August to win conference.
