With a powerful team returning, Utah volleyball coach Beth Launiere has upped the scheduling ante

If her players ever need a compliment, all Utah women's volleyball coach Beth Launiere has to do is point to the team's schedule.

Launiere delivered a demanding nonconference schedule in her 30th season, all designed to test — and, theoretically, reward — a team she expects to contend for one of the 16 hosting berths in the NCAA Tournament. So the Utes will welcome No. 7 Kentucky and No. 23 Cal Poly (plus Saint Mary’s) to the Huntsman Center for this weekend’s Utah Classic, then meet Cal Poly again in Pepperdine’s tournament and host No. 9 BYU in the annual rivalry match.

And then they'll stage Pac-12 competition against six Top 25 teams. Utah is picked fifth in the Pac-12, while landing just outside the Top 25 in the AVCA preseason poll.

The Utes are aware of the statement their coach is making about them, before they even take the court Friday. “They know,” Launiere said. “I was really honest with them. … We're just going to go for it and see what we've got.”

Junior outside hitter Dani Drews said the schedule “shows our coach knows how good we are and what we're capable of, so that's awesome.”

Immediate answers will come this weekend against three NCAA Tournament teams from 2018, led by Kentucky. Friday night's match will reunite teams that staged a five-set battle in Kentucky's tournament in 2017, when the Wildcats outlasted Utah and both teams reached the NCAA's Sweet 16 three months later.

The season-opening event is “a huge opportunity for us,” Drews said, “to kind of show ourselves and other people that we are a really good team.”

The Utes proved that in the second half of the Pac-12 schedule last season, with a 5-1 finishing stretch that included wins over top-20 teams Arizona and USC and gave them a 10-10 conference record. And then they beat Denver in the NCAA Tournament before losing to BYU, the No. 4 overall seed.

“At the end of last season, everyone was really in the groove and and knew their roles and figured out how to get wins,” Drews said. “I definitely think that'll carry over into this season.”

The Utes are strengthened by the return of middle blocker Berkeley Oblad, who sustained a season-ending elbow injury in September. They’ll again feature Drews, an All-Pac-12 player, and two players who received all-conference honorable mention: outside hitter Kenzie Koerber and libero Brianna Doehrmann.

Injuries to freshman Leah Schmidt and returning players Kinga Windisch and Megan Yett slowed the team's development this month, though. “We thought we were going to have a lot of depth,” Launiere said, “and it's gone.”

She was consoled by advice from Ute men's basketball coach Larry Krystkowiak, who told her, “At least, you had depth to start.”

This weekend, the Utes will get a good gauge of just how far their front-line players can take them.