COLLEGES / ALAN OTA : Bruins Will Try to Avoid a Block Party by Buckeyes

Fourth-seeded Ohio State, making its 11th appearance in the NCAA volleyball championships, will be trying to accomplish something no other Buckeye team has ever done: defeat UCLA in a semifinal match.

Ohio State (22-8), which plays the top-seeded Bruins (22-3) on Friday at Pauley Pavilion, has lost six semifinal matches with UCLA. Although the Bruins are appearing in a record 16th final four, this is their first since 1989.

The Buckeyes, who start two freshmen, two sophomores and two seniors, have played strong at the net, according to Coach Pete Hanson.

Freshman Jon Yunker, a 6-foot-4 middle hitter, was the nation’s block leader at 1.81 a game. Middle hitter Tom Hoff, a 6-foot-7 sophomore, was ranked fifth in the country in blocking at 1.69 and had a Buckeye record of 450 kills with a .368 hitting percentage. Setter Adam Spitznagle is a 6-foot-2 freshman.

“These kids play with the same intensity as those other veteran Buckeye teams, but they’re just doing it earlier in their careers,” Hanson said. “We do have more capable people in the middle, but previous teams have had better outside hitters.”

UCLA Coach Al Scates says the match will be decided at the net.

“I do think it’s going to be a battle in the middle of the court,” he said. “No other team has blockers ranked that high on the national list.”

Pacific Coach Joe Wortmann, whose Tigers lost to UCLA and Ohio State in March, believes the Bruins will dominate.

“UCLA serves so tough that Ohio State’s middles might not even factor in,” Wortmann said. “Unless something miraculous happens, like the Lakers surprising the Phoenix Suns, I don’t see them getting by UCLA.”

The team advancing from the 8 p.m. match will play the winner of the Cal State Northridge-Penn State semifinal, which starts at 6. The championship match will be on Saturday at 7:30 p.m. The third-place match will be at 5.

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Scates said studying videotapes of a loss to Stanford in March was crucial to UCLA’s win over the Cardinal in the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation championship last week.

“We could see that they used specific serving patterns to beat us,” Scates said. “So we simulated it in practice until we handled them all.

“And we practiced a variety of serves to get (Stanford’s Bob) Hillman out of the match. We figured he would have trouble if he moved to his left. That was the key.”

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UCLA senior Mike Sealy and sophomore Jeff Nygaard were among six players selected to the 1993 American Volleyball Coaches Assn. first team.

The 6-foot-7 Sealy, a former Santa Monica High standout, had a .437 hitting percentage and led the Bruin team with 1,094 set assists.

“When I’m through playing, I’ll have a chance to look back on how special it is, but I won’t have time until after this weekend,” Sealy said.

Nygaard, a 6-8 middle blocker who was the 1992 Volleyball Monthly freshman of the year, finished third nationally with a .486 hitting percentage and was tied for eighth in blocks at 1.62.

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UCLA senior Erik Smith improved his personal best in the javelin by more than two feet in Saturday’s meet with Brigham Young and Cal Poly San Luis Obispo at Drake Stadium. His throw of 243-feet-11 ranks third among collegians this year and is the second best in UCLA history.

“Anytime you have a lifetime best you feel great,” he said. “Since our heavy lifting in training won’t taper off until a week before Pac-10s, I know there’s still a lot left for a better mark.”

Bruin sophomore Greg Johnson is 11th nationally in the javelin with a toss of 230-8, an improvement of more than 15 feet from 1992.

Notes

Pepperdine senior outside hitter Tom Sorensen was named to the American Volleyball Coaches Assn. All-American first team.

The No. 15 Pepperdine baseball team will finish its home schedule with a three-game series against San Diego starting on Friday at 2:30 p.m. On Saturday the teams play a doubleheader starting at noon. Senior right-hander Steve Duda was named West Coast Conference pitcher of the week after winning his 41st career game on Friday against St. Mary’s. He leads the league with a 1.95 earned-run average. UCLA, ranked 25th, will play at Southern Utah on Friday and Saturday. The Bruins lead the Pacific 10 Southern Division in fielding with a .971 percentage. Junior first baseman Ryan McGuire leads the league with .781 slugging percentage.

The top-ranked UCLA women’s softball team clinched its fifth Pacific 10 championship in seven years last weekend when it defeated No. 10 California and Stanford on the road. The Bruins are 44-3 and 25-1 in conference play. UCLA Coach Sharron Backus gained her 700th victory on Sunday, the most wins ever for a Division I softball coach. Her record is 701-134-3 for an .837 winning percentage.

Earning All-Pacific 10 Conference golf second-team honors was UCLA junior Ted Gleason. Honorable-mention selections for the Bruins included senior Jorgen Aker, junior Kevin Claborn and senior Justin Hicks.