Road Trip Can Earn Rams All They Seek

FORT COLLINS, Colo. -- Coaches say it all the time: No one match is more important than the others.

Even Tom Hilbert wouldn't tell that to his team this week, not with a straight face. Thursday, his Colorado State volleyball team travels to face Utah State in a match which could provide the Rams everything they've sought from the start of Mountain West play – a regular-season championship and the top seed in the season-ending tournament, where the winner will carry away the automatic bid to the NCAA Championship.

"That's no doubt. It's for the championship, in my opinion," Hilbert said. "Utah State knows it, too."

The Rams enters the match at 13-3 in conference, a game up on both Utah State and San Jose State, each at 12-4. Technically, the Rams can absorb a loss and still share the tile with a win Saturday at Boise State, but this is not kindergarten, and nobody is forced to share their toys.

So the team enters Thursday with a winner-take-all mentality, and they're going to rely on their past experiences to cope with the magnitude of the moment.

"I think lots of great things from volleyball come from building mental images and drawing back on those during hard times," middle blocker Sasha Colombo said. "We know that both Utah State and Boise State are away games and won't be easy, so hopefully we can draw back on good moments we've had over the course of the season, comebacks especially. Even this past match, we didn't start out great the second set, but we managed to come back quickly. Something like that is really good for everyone to remember and build on."

The Rams were down 7-0 to Fresno State in the second set, rallied and completed a home sweep. That's commonplace, as Colorado State has won all nine conference matches at Moby Arena with sweeps. They are particularly good at home, but they've had some setbacks on the road.

A reverse sweep by Wyoming just more than a week ago, and a couple of 3-1 losses. But they also have had some success stories, particularly the reverse sweep they pulled off at San Diego State.

All of those outcomes – good and bad – Hilbert feels puts his team in a good spot to handle the task at hand.

"We've had all kinds of things happen to us," he said. "We've been in all kinds of situations now. We've played better at home, but we've had a couple of road experiences, like San Diego State, that have been really good memory-bank experiences for us. I think the team, they know it's important, they know the team is good and they know it's going to be a completely different type of match than the first time we played them, so I think it's going to be a very good environment, and I think my team will handle it well."

Defensive specialist Ruby Kayser said it's been so long ago, she doesn't really recall the first Utah State match, a 3-0 sweep at Moby Arena. But she does know what makes the team click, and so does Hilbert.

What he knows is imperative is the Rams have to serve and pass well to win the match. When the team does those two things, they have been very good. At home, they've been stellar in those areas, but on the road, they've been caught in the net.

The Rams have played more matches at home than away this year, 14 to 11. But the vast majority of their aces come at home (just 38.5 percent on the road), and most of their service errors are away from Moby (53.6 percent).

Kayser, with 21 aces on the year, said the Rams have to take advantage of pre-match workouts to find their groove at the service line.

"It's taking the serve and pass we get the day before the game really serious," she said. "It's really easy to check out and go through the motions. When we get there that day and do serve and pass, really lock in on tracking the ball well and serving the areas you know you're scouted to serve in the game. One thing I personally try to focus on that (associate head coach) Emily Kohan always reminds us is, when you get to a point where you're uncomfortable serving, you just focus on one really small point on a player, so you focus on their right shoulder and just really dial in on that instead of looking at the whole court. When we're in Moby, you're so used to it you can kind of just serve the way you feel comfortable, to where you really have to focus in on the road."

It will be a continuing trend, because the Rams will not play at home again this season. The conference tournament will be held in Las Vegas, and a bid to the NCAA Tournament will take them elsewhere, too. To be at their best, they need to serve well.

To some, it may feel like pressure, but then again, this type of match is what they all hoped for when they came to college and joined Hilbert's program. The big moments and the chance to seize them.

"I think we're really excited. We worked really hard to stay on top of the conference all year, and for it to come down to these last few games is really exciting," Kayser said. "I think we put a lot of emphasis being our best by the conference tournament, and I think we've done a really good job of each week, I feel, we are getting better at something. It's an awesome feeling to look at where we started and look at how we're playing now."

And with everything they wanted on the line.

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