UNLV star gains experience at Pan Am Games

Nick Christensen

Tuesday, Sept. 9, 2003 | 9:08 a.m.

Do you know your volleyball lingo?

By Nick Christensen

Sheila Ocasio-Clemente led the UNLV volleyball team to a sweep of its weekend tournament by recording an attack percentage of .425. What the heck is an attack percentage?

Attack percentage is figured by the formula (K-E)/A. E represents attack errors (hits out of bounds, etc.). It is subtracted from K, which represents kills or successful spikes. That total is divided by the total number of attempts -- A.

After one weekend of play, the UNLV volleyball team seemed to be headed toward another disappointing season.

The Rebels went 1-2 in Los Angeles, losing to Sacramento State and Loyola Marymount before beating West Virginia. But in the week between their tough trip and last weekend's UNLV Invitational, the Rebels didn't worry.

UNLV middle blocker Sheila Ocasio-Clemente, back from the Pan American Games just in time for the regular season, hadn't quite found her form -- and that was just fine with coach Deitre Collins.

"It's a positive for her in that she gets to go against good competitors there, and I think she's a better player because of the competition," said Collins. "But it was bad for us in that I think that's what hurt us last week. We never got to get into our rotation that we really needed to be in."

With another week of practice, Collins was able to use her primary rotation. It paid off -- UNLV soundly swept its weekend tournament, losing only one game out of the three matches played against Cal State-Fullerton, Lamar and Morgan State.

Clemente spent two weeks in Santo Domingo, helping the Puerto Rican team to a sixth-place finish in the women's bracket. She'll return to the Dominican Republic in December, for the continental Olympic qualifier. She said she hopes to lead Puerto Rico to its first appearance in the Olympic volleyball competition.

"I was nervous about it, because it was my first participation," said Ocasio-Clemente. "It's still the game of volleyball. We all play the same game.

"I learned to be more aggressive. The teams we played over there, they were taller and stronger and faster. I think that I had to pick up the level of my game."

After the initial adjustment of getting back to the Rebels' system, Clemente's experience has paid off. She recorded a .425 attack percentage, and overtook Amber Graham for second place on UNLV's all-time total blocks and assisted blocks list, recording five on the weekend.

The biggest challenge upon return was that adjustment.

"It was difficult for me to get back into my setter and my teammates, and to get used to what they were doing," she said. In the Loyola tournament in Los Angeles, her attack percentage was a low .246, with only three blocks.

Collins said that with Clemente's return, she was faced with the dilemma of needing one player to get into the team's system without putting too much pressure on the rest of the team.

"You can't practice anymore than we did," said Collins. "We still have a certain amount of injuries that we have to always gauge, so we couldn't suddenly cram in a whole bunch of hours to make up for the time she was gone. Then we'd be in worse shape than we were."

The Rebels (4-2) head to Spokane this week for Gonzaga's tournament, facing Gonzaga, Idaho State and Boise State in the two-day tournament. They face second-ranked Hawaii in Honolulu Sept. 20.