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Cal Olympic Sports Week in Review: September 12th, 2013

Plenty of California victories this past week with various teams rising in the rankings. Read the quick recap of all the Cal victories here. GO BEARS!

By Ruey Yen
There were plenty to cheer about for Cal Athletics this past week.
There were plenty to cheer about for Cal Athletics this past week.
Kelley L Cox-USA TODAY Sports

It has been a great weekend for Cal Athletics.

With all the fall sports in action, I'll let the various Cal Athletics twitter account do most of the work (although this week is pretty fun to write about given the results). The team of the week for this past week was the Cal Volleyball, for exceeding expectations, beating a ranked team (Creighton) at their home (in Omaha, Nebraska) in straight sets, and returning back to the rankings. 4th ranked Cal Men's Water Polo gets the honorable mention for going 4-0 in dominant fashion in their first tournament of the season (in San Diego).

Cal Volleyball

After a very successful week (see more about it below), the Bears are now back amongst the ranked. Bears are back home this weekend with all 3 matches streamed live for free.

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7 p.m. PT - Cal Poly (4-2) vs. No. 23 Cal (5-0)
Haas Pavilion - Berkeley, Calif.
Cal All-Time Series vs. the Mustangs: 9-6
Last meeting: W, 3-1 (9-14-2008)

Viewing Info for Cal Volleyball

Live Video: Pac-12 Digital (Free)

Live Stats: CalBears.com

Twitter Updates: @CalVolleyball

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Bears traveled to Omaha, Nebraska this past weekend to play in the Bluejays Invitation hosted by Creighton. This trip is probably setup as a homecoming for middle blocker Lillian Schonewise. in her weekly blog, Adrienne Gehan talked about visiting the Schonewise household.

Cal Volleyball 3, South Florida 0: 25-17, 25-20, 25-20

Higgins had 14 kills at a .333 hitting percentage while Gehan added 12 kills and hit .357. The Bears hit .311 as a team, the third consecutive outing they have hit at least .300.

Cal Volleyball 3, Northern Colorado 0: 25-14, 25-16, 25-16

Cal registered 13 blocks and Adrienne Gehan had nine kills and 11 digs.

Sophomore Lara Vukasovic and junior Christina Higgins each set career-highs with seven blocks, while Vukasovic also notched seven kills. Senior setter Joan Caloiaro had a career-best three aces and also served the first seven points of the match as Cal took early command.

Cal Volleyball 3, No.19 Creighton 0: 26-24, 25-21, 25-14

"I think they might feel like a small corner has been turned and this is the kind of team that can compete at a high level," Cal coach Rich Feller said. "I think they see a little glimmer. Last year was hit or miss. It's very gratifying to play a team that's big and that's good and that's at home."

The Bears dismantled the Bluejays (4-1) with pinpoint passing and defense while exhibiting a solid block. The superior ball control allowed Cal to hit for a .339 percentage, led by senior Adrienne Gehan's 18 kills at a .378 clip. Junior Christina Higgins added 10 kills and four blocks while sophomore middle blocker Lara Vukasovic added nine kills at a .471 percentage.

Gehan was named the tournament most valuable player, the second straight week she's earned MVP honors of a tourney. She was also selected as the MVP off last weekend's Cal Molten Classic.

Vukasovic and setter Joan Caloiaro were named to the All-Tournament Team.

After two weekends, the Cal Volleyball rotation for this season have emerged. The setter is senior Joan Caloiaro. In the backrow, it is new freshman libero Maddy Kerr (daughter of former NBA sharpshooter Steve Kerr) with defensive specialists in Mary McKennon and UC Davis transfer Sarah Cole.

Up front, the Bears are led by senior Adrienne Gehan with Michelle Neumayr and Christina Higgins on the outside and Lara Vukasovic and Lillian Schonewise in the middle.

By the way, Cal Volleyball has posted a couple of the videos that they show between sets at home games.

While she is better known for her hitting, senior Adrienne Gehan is talking about passing here.

Although she has lost the libero position to newcomer, freshman Maddy Kerr, here is Mary McKennon (Cal's libero last year) talking about the libero position.

You can probably see the next videos in this series this coming weekend, when No.23 Cal Volleyball hosts the Hilton Garden Inn Invitational when they play against Cal Poly, Santa Clara, and Kansas State. Now that the expectation are higher, can the Bears remain flawless (not dropping any sets) before conference play begins in two weeks (UC Davis next week)?

Cal Men's Soccer

Cal Men's Soccer 1, San Francisco 0

Bears won their lone game of the week, a 1-0 victory over the San Francisco Dons. The match was scoreless for basically the entire game until this happened (courtesy of CGB Hall of Famer and valuable contributor, Fiatlux...it's not exactly clear what had happened but Ken provided his own commentary on this game wining goal with less than a minute left).

Junior forward Stefano Bonomo assisted Christian Thierjung, a freshman midfielder/forward, on the goal.

Up next:

The 5th ranked Bears (3-0-0) travel further on the road to "Happy Valley" to play Penn State (2-2-0) on Friday night.

Cal Women's Soccer

Playing two games in San Francisco, the Bears stays undefeated with wins over Harvard and UC Davis.

Cal Women's Soccer 2, Harvard 1

SCORING SUMMARY:

2:43 Cal -- Onumonu, Ifeoma (unassisted)
67:51 Cal -- Boureille, Celeste (Fitzpatrick, Kaitlyn)
77:15 Harvard -- Varela, Lauren (unassisted)

SAVES:

Harvard 5 (Kanten, Bethany 5), California 4 (Kruger, Emily 4)

Cal Women's Soccer 4, UC Davis 0

SCORING SUMMARY:

30:09 CAL Witteman, Samantha (DeBack, Mekenna)

47:46 CAL Onumonu, Ifeoma (Lamet, Kory)

49:15 CAL Fitzpatrick, Kaitlyn (Mercik, Rachel)

55:47 CAL Mercik, Rachel (Lawson, Emi)

SAVES:

UC DAVIS 10 (Jern, Taylor 10), California 3 (Kruger, Emily 3)

Up Next:

With no matches this weekend, the No. 18/17 California women's soccer team will host former Golden Bear players for its annual Alumni Weekend. Current and former players and coaches will enjoy a packed weekend, including the Cal vs. Ohio State football game on Saturday and a 7 vs. 7 exhibition match pitting current players against former players at California Memorial Stadium Sunday.


Cal Men's Water Polo

In case you missed it, the Cal Men's Water Polo team got a nice serenade of the Cal fight song from the freshman Cal women swimmers, including Missy Franklin.

Bears then kicked off the season with a dominant showing down in San Diego.

No.4 Cal Men's Water Polo 21, Redlands 3

No.4 Cal Men's Water Polo 13, UC San Diego 10

No.4 Cal Men's Water Polo 17, No.13 LMU 7

No.4 Cal Men's Water Polo 15, No.17 UC Davis 4

Bears outscored their opponents by a margin of 66 to 24. Lots of Golden Bears scored (so many in fact, these stats are not yet entered into the CalBears.com site).

Up Next:

Following the Triton Invitational, the Bears will return to Spieker Aquatics Complex where they will host an Alumni match at 12 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 14. The Alumni match will be honoring the 40th anniversary of Cal's 1973 National Championship squad, the first of the Bears' NCAA-record 13 national crowns. On Sept. 21-22, Cal will be hosting the 16-team NorCal Invitational, featuring the nation's top collegiate water polo teams.

Cal Field Hockey

Cal Field Hockey 4, Dartmouth 2

Pac-12.com has the highlights of the Bear's 4-2 home opener victory over Dartmouth. See how Andrea Earle win her Player of the Week honor in the highlights.

Cal Field Hockey 1, Liberty 0

Bears cap the perfect weekend at home with another win over an East Coast team.

Up Next:

Cal Field Hockey traveled to Chicago this weekend for two matches: against Northwestern on Friday and against Ohio on Saturday.

Cal Men's Golf

Bears were without two returning first team All-Americans in Michael Kim and Michael Weaver since that duo was helping the US in winning the Walker Cup over Great Britain and Ireland. The recently graduated Max Homa is the third Cal Bears playing for the US in the Walker Cup.


Cal Women's Golf

COURSE: Ptarmigan Country Club (par 72; 6,352 yards)

CAL LINEUP:

T2. Nicola Rössler – 73-71-69=213 (-3)

4. Carly Childs – 73-72-70=215 (-1)

T12. Hannah Suh – 70-76-74=220 (+4)

T24. Morgan Thompson – 75-77-73=225 (+9)

T71. Roberta Röller – 80-80-80=240 (+24)

TEAM RESULTS (GolfWeek Ranking):

1. (49) California – 291-296-286=873 (+9)

1. (75) Colorado – 297-294-291=882 (+18)

3. (119) Illinois – 295-303-288=886 (+22)

4. (46) UNLV – 302-298-288=888 (+24)

5. (92) New Mexico – 294-298-299=891 (+27)


Cal Women's Swimming and Diving

Missy Franklin was just named female Athlete of the Month by the U.S. Sports Acaedmy for her record breaking 6 golds in the FINA World Championship in August.

Season officially starts for the Bears officially the next weekend at Cal Poly for the "Queen of the Pool".

GO BEARS!

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