Upsets.<\/p>\n
The best teams loathe them. The underdogs love them.<\/p>\n
And the Bruins fall into the former.<\/p>\n
No. 2 UCLA beach volleyball (18-3) will compete against No. 4 Cal Poly (20-2), No. 1 Stanford (21-2), No. 4 USC (21-4) and No. 10 Long Beach State (18-6) at the Best in the West tournament in Laguna Beach, California, on Friday and Saturday. <\/p>\n
The Bruins are coming off a 3-1 showing as of the Texas Invitational last weekend, where they sustained their sole loss to No. 6 Texas. The 3-2 defeat marked an upset \u2013 UCLA swept Texas in its previous two matchups, Feb. 19 and March 14, respectively.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can come back from anything,\u201d said coach Jenny Johnson Jordan. \u201cThey had a lot of fight in them. Even going down, I had full confidence in the team.\u201d <\/p>\n
UCLA will likely look to bounce back as it prepares to face several of the nation\u2019s top teams.<\/p>\n
Cal Poly\u2019s only two losses this season came against UCLA and USC, respectively.<\/p>\n
![\"(Leydi](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/sp.bvb_.pre_.4.1.26.B.LC_.jpg\")
Coach Jenny Johnson Jordan talks to junior Cassie Dodd and sophomore Alexa Fernandez. Johnson partnered with former Bruin Annett Davis at the Sydney Olympic Games in 2000, when they finished fifth. (Leydi Cris Cobo Cordon\/Daily Bruin senior staff)<\/p>\n
Erin Inskeep and Ella Connor anchor the Mustangs\u2019 top court and boast a 16-match winning streak. Cal Poly has struggled away from San Luis Obispo, however, holding a 3-2 road record compared to its 17-0 combined tally at home and on neutral courts. <\/p>\n
Stanford has similarly recorded just two losses this season and rides a nine-match winning streak. The Bruins and Cardinal split their first two meetings this season, while the former leads the all-time series 26-5.<\/p>\n
In their most recent matchup March 7, UCLA\u2019s court five pair of freshman Mallory LaBreche and redshirt junior Kenzie Brower clinched the dual contest with two 21-18 set wins. The Bruins have continued experimenting with lower-court pairings, mixing experience levels and skill sets. <\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of things we\u2019ve been doing recently have been working really well,\u201d Jordan said. \u201cWe\u2019ve had seasons where that\u2019s happened before, and then we\u2019ve come up short at the end. We are trying to do things a little bit differently this year by mixing things up a little bit more than we have in the past.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rivalries often produce the most compelling matchups.<\/p>\n
And the UCLA-USC rivalry is no exception.<\/p>\n
USC has yet to defeat UCLA this season, falling 3-1 on Feb. 21.<\/p>\n
The Trojans are also coming off a loss to the Longhorns at last weekend\u2019s tournament, marking their first road defeat of the season. USC leads the all-time series 29-22 against UCLA \u2013 though through the past 10 matchups \u2013 the teams are tied 5-5. <\/p>\n
![\"(Holden](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/sp.bvb_.pre_.4.1.26.C.HY_.jpg\")
Sophomore Sally Perez dives for the ball. Perez achieved a first-place finish at the FIVB U21 Beach Volleyball World championships alongside Stanford’s Avery Jackson ahead of the Bruins’ 2026 campaign. (Holden Yung\/Daily Bruin)<\/p>\n
UCLA will close the tournament against No. 10 Long Beach State. Long Beach State holds a 7-6 record against ranked opponents this season, including a loss to UCLA on Feb. 28.<\/p>\n
Malia Gementera and Taylor Hagenah lead the team on court one with an 18-6 record. In the teams\u2019 previous meeting, Long Beach State fell in straight sets to MPSF Pair of the Year Maggie Boyd and sophomore Sally Perez.<\/p>\n
The Bruins could look to boost their uber-competitive approach this weekend, regardless of the competition level.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur team mentality is to go out there and give every single team our all,\u201d said redshirt sophomore Kaley Mathews. \u201cWhether we\u2019re playing an unranked team, or whether we\u2019re playing the number two seed \u2013 no matter what \u2013 we want to give everybody a fair game.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Upsets. The best teams loathe them. The underdogs love them. And the Bruins fall into the former. No.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":248664,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[131,133,132],"class_list":["post-248663","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-long-beach","tag-long-beach","tag-long-beach-headlines","tag-long-beach-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248663","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=248663"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248663\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/248664"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=248663"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=248663"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=248663"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}