The Pacific 10 Conference schedule started with high notes and low notes for the No. 25 Arizona women's volleyball team.

The high note was a 3-0 victory over California on Saturday. The bad notes came in a 3-1 loss to No. 2 Stanford on Friday night.

"There is a sense of confidence building with this team, because we know that we are a good team," UA head coach Dave Rubio said. "There's tangible proof that we are a good team and we're on our way to becoming an even better team."

The win over Cal was not as dramatic as the loss to Stanford, but in terms of conference record it was equally important.

"This is where experience really makes a big difference," Rubio said. "Experience says that we know what Stanford is and we know how good they are. Let's go out there and play hard, but the match to take care of is the Cal game. Even though we went out and played great against Stanford, the players knew that we needed to come back and play another great game."

In the first game of the Cal match, UA setter Michaela Ebben got her first of what would be five kills in the match and sparked the team to a 11-2 run that would cinch the game at 15-5. The score in the game would have been closer if not for the key sideouts from middle blocker Keisha Johnson.

"We knew what we had to do," Johnson said, comparing the Stanford and Cal matches. "We talked about it (Friday) as far as coming out and playing both matches equally. After we got started, I think it was fine."

The second game of the match was dominated by Arizona (10-2 overall, 1-1 in the Pac-10). Cal (2-4, 0-2) went looking for changes when the Wildcats went up 9-2. The Bears substituted senior setter Lynn Guevara for freshman Jennifer Kriste, who in turn played well for them. Cal made a late game surge, but the Wildcats were able to cap off the game after four attempts at game-point, winning 15-6.

"The players understand that every conference team is good enough to beat you and there is enough pride across the net that they are not going to give you anything for free," Rubio said.

The Stanford match was highly anticipated, and it was as competitive a match as Arizona has played all year.

The crowd of 1.211 was on its feet as Arizona took the first game of the match, 15-9. Stanford All-American Kristen Folkl didn't become a factor until the end of the game and by then it was too late. Folkl did show up later in the match and racked up 20 kills, eight digs and 5 blocks. The Cardinal (8-1, 2-0) won the last three games, 15-13, 15-10, 15-9.

"I think as a team we played really well - we just couldn't put it away when we needed to," Johnson said. "I think we're kind of anxious for revenge."

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