BERKELEY – California volleyball will look to get back in the Pac-12 win column this weekend as it returns home to Haas Pavilion, hosting UCLA on Friday night at 7 p.m. PT and USC on Sunday at 2 p.m.
 
The Golden Bears (12-5, 1-5 Pac-12) are 9-27 against the Bruins (9-7, 1-5 Pac-12) and 12-68 against the Trojans (11-5, 5-1 Pac-12) all-time. They last defeated UCLA in 2018 and USC in 2014.
 
UCLA has a 5-4 record on the road but is on a three-game losing streak. As a team, the Bruins rank 22nd in the NCAA with 2.65 blocks per set and second in the Pac-12 with 158 total blocks under new head coach Alfee Reft. Cal will keep an eye on senior Anna Dodson, who has the fifth-highest hitting percentage in the conference (.377) and ranks sixth with 73 total blocks, as well as graduate transfer Desiree Becker, who leads the team with 74 blocks.
 
USC is just 3-5 on the road this season but is nearly undefeated in conference play, with its only loss coming to then-No. 23 Arizona State last week in five sets. The Trojans rank 23rd in the NCAA with 12.75 assists per set and 40th with 13.48 kills per set on a .270 team hitting percentage (24th NCAA). Two-time AVCA All-American Skylar Fields is one of the best outside hitters in the nation this year, ranking among the NCAA's top-10 players in no fewer than six offensive categories, while junior Mia Tuaniga has been a steady presence at setter with 10.03 assists per set (45th NCAA).
 
Friday night's match is Cal's annual "Dig Pink" game, in which the team partners with the Side-Out Foundation to raise funding for metastatic breast cancer research. Fans are encouraged to wear pink to the match and help the program reach its $2,000 fundraising goal at the Dig Pink page.
 
The first 500 fans to arrive for Sunday's match will receive a free water bottle. Cal will be hosting a team autograph session on the court after the game.
 
LI LEADS
Freshman outside hitter Xuemeng (Maggie) Li has already cemented her name in the Cal record books as she is the first player in program history to win Pac-12 honors in consecutive weeks, as well as the Bears' first four-time Pac-12 Freshman of the Week. She earned Cal's first Pac-12 weekly honor since 2019 - and its first rookie honor since 2018 - after the Bears' first three matches of the season. Li totaled 34 kills and 27 digs with a .313 hitting percentage at the Army Invitational, earning her way onto the all-tournament team. The next week, Li added two stellar matches to her season with a 20-kill, nine-dig performance against Portland State and a 13-kill outing on .579 hitting against Southern Utah, earning her second Pac-12 Freshman of the Week honor - the first Golden Bear to earn the award twice since Christina Higgins in 2011. Li followed that up by posting 61 kills and 50 digs over the next four games, including three straight double-doubles with a 24-kill performance against Texas State, to earn her third consecutive nod and become the first freshman in conference history to start off the season with three straight weekly awards. In her most recent weekly award campaign, she totaled 21 kills and 13 digs on .340 hitting in the win over Arizona to help Cal break a 57-match Pac-12 losing streak, then posted another 19 kills against No. 25 Arizona State. Currently, she ranks first among all NCAA freshmen with 4.17 kills per set (4th Pac-12/24th NCAA) and 4.75 points per set (5th Pac-12/30th NCAA), as well as second among NCAA freshmen with 263 kills (2nd Pac-12/24th NCAA) and 299.0 points (3rd Pac-12/28th NCAA).
She also has a team-leading 25 service aces, fourth-most in the conference, and leads the team with seven double-doubles on the year while ranking second on the roster in digs (162).
 
DESA DOMINATES
Senior libero Tara DeSa currently leads the Pac-12 with 4.49 digs per set (0.53 ahead of second place) and 283 digs (48 ahead of second place) to anchor a Cal defense that is second in the Pac-12 with a .163 opponent hitting percentage. She recorded her first career double-double (10 assists, 16 digs) in September against Montana State, and has two All-Tournament nods (including an Army Invitational MVP) to her name this season. DeSa had her best full year at libero in her third year with the Bears, ranking third in the Pac-12 with 448 total digs and fourth in the conference with 4.00 digs per set. A three-time all-tournament team member, she became just the 11th Golden Bear ever to record 30 or more digs in a single match with a 32-dig effort against Arizona - just one shy of the all-time program record. DeSa also posted 118 assists, third most on the team. Entering Week Eight of the 2023 season, she is just 37 digs away from earning a spot on the program's all-time top-10 list.
 
MAEDER'S MARK
Junior setter Annalea Maeder crossed the 2,000 career assists mark against Utah (Sept. 24) and enters  this weekend with 2,154 to her name. Having totaled 607 assists so far on the year, she is on pace to smash her 2022 season total of 846. Maeder is currently second on the team with six double-doubles this season and has posted 30 or more assists in 11 of Cal's 17 matches so far. On Sept. 8, she set a new career high of 53 assists against Southeastern Louisiana then posted 54 later that day against Texas State. As of Week Eight, Maeder leads the team in assists and is second in service aces (23), third in digs (152) and fourth in total blocks (27).
 
NEW COACH ON THE BLOCK
Crissy Jones Schoonderwoerd stepped into the interim head coach role for the Golden Bears and powered them to a 11-0 start - undefeated in nonconference play - after being hired as an assistant in February 2023. She previously acted as assistant coach for Cal Poly beach volleyball in 2020 while finding success on the AVP and FIVB circuits as a player. In her collegiate career at Washington and later at Cal Poly, she became just the second player in NCAA history to earn All-American honors for both indoor and beach volleyball. Jones Schoonderwoerd is joined on the staff by two first-year assistant coaches in Cal alumna Savannah Rennie and AVP pro Billy Allen.
 
WELCOME TO BEAR TERRITORY
Five newcomers joined the Bears in 2023. Setter Paige Morningstar (Pittsburgh), a redshirt sophomore who spent her first two years with Louisville, comes to Berkeley with NCAA Tournament experience under her belt and an impressive high school resume that includes multiple National High School Female Athlete of the Year honors and four state championships. Outside hitter Xuemeng (Maggie) Li (Beijing) has experience as a member of the Chinese Women's National U20 and II Teams, while Ashley Li (Diamond Bar) was selected to the Division 2 All-CIF Southern Section Team. Sawyer Thomsen (Lawrence, Kansas) and Sophia Johnson (Wayzata, Minnesota) round out the group as highly ranked players in their respective states (Thomsen as the No. 1 middle blocker in Kansas and Johnson as Minnesota's No. 2 libero).
 
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