Justin Howell and Elizabeth Crandall have a rule.

"We'll come home and talk about gymnastics, then shut it down," said Howell, Cal's head women's gymnastics coach.

Howell and Crandall are married, and Crandall is Howell's assistant coach.

"Our chemistry as coaches is great," Howell said. "We eat, sleep and breathe gymnastics. We don't bring work home all the time, but it's nice that we can talk about it over coffee in the morning."

Howell and Crandall have been busy coaching one of Cal's best teams in recent years. The Bears have spent most of the season in the top-25 and are poised to qualify for the NCAA regionals for the first time since 2007.

The Bears will need to have one of the top 36 regional qualifying scores at the end of the season to advance into the postseason. Cal currently sits at No. 35.

"I feel great about it," Howell said. "I'd like to feel a little more solid, but with the way this team is performing, there's no reason why we can't get back up there a little bit."

Cal will next be in action Friday night for a three-way meet at No. 12 Stanford, along with No. 9 Oregon State.

The regional qualifying score (RPS) is determined by taking a team's top-six all-around scores during the season, dropping the highest score, and then averaging the rest. Howell said the Bears' RPS has been driven down by one subpar meet at Utah.

"We're ready to get rid of that score," Howell said. "We want to kick it out of our average so we can get back in the top-25. Hopefully we'll do it this weekend."

If the Bears qualify for the NCAA regionals, they would have to finish in the top-2 there to advance to the NCAA championships.

Cal is led by junior Alicia Asturias and Mariesah Pierce, the team's top all-around performers. Freshman Serena Leong has also excelled on the vault, balance beam and floor exercise.

"We had an uncharacteristically bad meet at Utah," Howell said. "But there's no reason we shouldn't be able to drop that score. That would be a huge leap for us."

This week's edition focuses on the women's water polo team, especially All-American Emily Csikos, who is back with the Bears this season after spending 2012 with the Canadian National Team.

It took eight years, but Nancy McDaniel and the Cal women's golf team finally will get its chance again at Ruby Hill Golf Club in Pleasanton.

In 2005, the Bears hosted the Pac-10 championships at Ruby Hill and finished what McDaniel called a disappointing fifth place. Cal hasn't hosted a tournament since.

That will change this week when Ruby Hill will once again serve as the host site for a Cal tournament, this time the Cal Classic on Monday and Tuesday.

"We had a great team in 2005 and finished fifth. It was really disappointing, actually," McDaniel said. "To be able to host a tournament again means a lot to the program - to be able to give back to all of the tournaments that we participate in every year, that means a lot to us. Ruby Hill is a great facility."

Eleven teams will compete in the Cal Classic - including fellow Pac-12 teams Arizona State, Stanford and Oregon State. The field also includes Coastal Carolina, Fresno State, San Diego State, San Jose State, UC Davis, USF and UNLV. Ruby Hill features a par-72, 6,203-yard course.

McDaniel said it's a challenge hosting a tournament, particularly in finding a course that is available and determining dates that work for enough schools to field an event.

"This year, everything aligned and we're here," McDaniel said.

The Bears won their second-ever Pac-12 Championship last year and have two golfers returning from that squad  - senior Jacqueline Williams and junior Nicola Rossler. Cal opened the spring season last weekend at the Peg Barnard Invitational at Stanford and finished second out of 13 teams. That included beating out two top-10 teams in the process.

Sophomore Morgan Thompson finished fourth individually last weekend, shooting a 1-under 141 for the two-day event.

Cal features two freshmen in its lineup with local ties that have played Ruby Hill in the past - Hannah Suh of San Jose and Carly Childs of Alameda.

"We feel like we're climbing the ladder right now," McDaniel said. "It's a nice place to be. This is a team to watch out for. They're not in the limelight at all at this moment, but this is a team to kind of track."

Corvallis, Oregon isn't exactly known as a factory for elite swimmers. So how did Cal freshman Jacob Pebley wind up on the USA Junior National Team?

"My family used to raft a lot, and they didn't want me to drown," Pebley said.

In the safety of a calm, contained swimming pool, Pebley has flourished. Despite training in relative obscurity in the Pacific Northwest, Pebley became one of the top backstrokers in the country. He had top programs like Texas, Florida and Georgia vying for his talents, but ultimately chose to join the two-time NCAA champions in Berkeley.

"I was always training by myself," Pebley said. "Coming here was completely different. Every practice is hard."

While Pebley swam for a club in Corvallis, there was nobody else there at his level. He was the only one to qualify for the Olympic Trials. He said there has been one other male swimmer from his club to earn a Division I scholarship.

"It's pretty cool to come from a town that doesn't have many D-I swimmers," Pebley said. "I'm used to being the big fish in a small pond, and I want to have that feeling again. But I have to work for it."

There's no question Pebley is surrounded by high-level swimmers at Cal, but the freshman is already carving out his own legacy in Berkeley. He owns the top time in the country this year in the 200 backstroke with a mark of 1:41.62.

"You don't see too many swimmers coming out of Oregon, in general," Cal coach Dave Durden said. "But his club program coach did a great job. For Jacob to come to an environment where he is surrounded by some Olympians, guys that are comparable in the world to where he is at, there is a comfort level to that. You can see him get better and better."

While being around fellow accomplished swimmers can be comforting, it is also a change from what he was used to back home. The internal competition is raising the level of his performance, as his performance in the 200 backstroke indicates.

"I like being at the top," Pebley said. "This is what I want. I feel like it's my event."

While Pebley clearly already is one of the top backstrokers in the country, next year he will have to compete just to retain that title on his own team. In 2013-14, Cal will see the arrival of six-star recruit Ryan Murphy, who has a best 200 back time of 1:40.90.

Pebley has raced internationally with Murphy and the two are friends.

"I couldn't be happier," Pebley said. "My goal is to make the Olympics, and racing a guy who has the same goal and is on the same level as me is going to push both of us every day. He's going to be great for the team."

Speaking of the team, the Bears are coming up on judgment time in college swimming. Cal hosts rival Stanford on Saturday at 1 p.m. at Spieker Aquatics Complex, then it's off to the Pac-12 Championships next week in Federal Way, Wash.  The Bears will look for their third straight NCAA championship at the end of March in Indianapolis.

"It's always a different group, so even though we have a lot of guys that return with NCAA experience, it doesn't necessarily mean that much," Durden said. "There are some great experienced guys that know how to handle that meet. But it's more how that information is relayed to our younger guys. I think we have some good swimmers that have some good swims in them. But we really need to be clicking and firing as a team come the end of March, rather than just rely on a couple of individuals to take us there."

The Bear Blog will be on hiatus the rest of this week. See you next week!

Baseball coach David Esquer speaks at Bay Area Media Day:

Cal's women's tennis team doesn't get to play indoors very often. When it does, there are more differences than just a lack of uncontrollable elements.

In addition to the fact there is no wind, glaring sun or fluctuating temperature, there is nowhere to hide. And that is a good thing.

Because of the confined quarters, teammates are naturally closer to each other. That, in turn, fosters more of a team dynamic.

"It's so intense because we cheer so loud on the court," said Cal sophomore Zsofi Susanyi, the seventh-ranked singles player in the country. "It's so much more fun because of that. It's different because it's indoors and we're kind of close."

The No. 7 Bears gets one of their two indoor experiences of the year this weekend at the ITA National Women's Team Indoor Championship at the Boar's Head Sports Club in Charlottesville, Va. Cal, the No. 5 seed in the field, meets No. 16 Michigan on Friday at 3:30 p.m. PT.

The Bears are one of 15 teams that advanced to the event by winning a ITA Kickoff Weekend title two weeks ago. Host Virginia rounds out the 16-team field. The Bears have reached the semifinals of the Indoor Championships in three of the past four years, including last season.

"Last year, a bunch of us lost our voices because we were cheering so loud for each other," Susanyi said. "It's a really big deal. No matter what, we are going out there to do whatever we can do to win for the team. It's so much better to win for all of us."

The Indoor Championship traditionally serves as a barometer for the nation's top teams early in the season. Most of the country's elite programs will be in Charlottesville, and the Bears are eager to see where they stack up against top competition.

"It's a national championship," Cal coach Amanda Augustus said. "It's early in the team season, so everyone is kind of getting a first look at everyone's team lineup at this time of year. It's a good opportunity for us to play out of region and play ranked teams that wouldn't ordinarily come out here and play us in a regular-season match.

Augustus said she is especially interested in exploring her doubles combinations to see what will be the team's best lineup moving forward. The Bears are strong at the top of their singles lineup with Susany and junior Anett Schutting, the nation's No. 9 singles player.

"Doubles-wise, do we have the right combination?" Augustus said. "We're pretty fortunate this year to have pretty good depth on the team, so I think we have a lot of options in terms of doubles. This is kind off a first look at it. We can move stuff around a bit. We need that doubles point to beat top-5, top-10 teams. That doubles point is huge."

Cal had a strong showing at the annual indoor championship in the fall, the USTA/ITA National Indoor Intercollegiate Championships in Flushing Meadows, N.Y. Schutting advanced to the finals while Susanyi made the semis.

Susanyi is Cal's No. 1 singles player. She advanced to the semifinals of the NCAA Singles championships as a freshman last season.

"Everyone knows Zsofi from last year," Augustus said. "I think she's ready for it and I think she's excited about it. She knows it's going to be tough."

Football coach Sonny Dykes talks about Signing Day on the Pac-12 Networks on Wednesday night:

The "Unity '13" Tour is about to get started.

The third-ranked Cal softball team opens the 2013 season Friday at the Kajikawa Classic in Tempe, Ariz., and after knocking on the door of a Women's College World Series championship last season, the Bears are unified in the singular goal of taking that final step this June.

"Last year, we were hungry. This year, we're hungrier," Cal senior catcher Lindsey Ziegenhirt said. "We have really high expectations of ourselves this year and we expect to meet them and exceed them. Everyone is working together. It's exciting to be out here at practice."

The Bears have advanced to each of the past two Women's College World Series, but last year's ouster stung more because they were ranked No. 1 most of the season and many pegged them as the favorite heading into the postseason. The team has adopted the team motto of "Unity 13," a constant reminder to maintain solidarity throughout the 2013 season.

"They understand they're going to have to be a great team together," Cal coach Diane Ninemire said. "We'll have some youth out there at times, and our older players are going to have to be good leaders and help them out. The team is really blending well together. We're really looking forward to a great year."

While the Bears return a strong nucleus of returners, they also will be moving on without their top three hitters in terms of batting average from last season - Jamia Reid, Frani Echavarria and Valerie Arioto. In Arioto, Cal loses arguably the top player in the country.

But perhaps most important, senior Jolene Henderson is still in the circle for the Bears, and that alone makes Cal a championship contender. Henderson is a two-time first team All-American with the endurance to pitch the majority of the innings this season for the Bears. As a sophomore in 2011, Henderson led the country with 333 1/3 innings pitched.

Henderson is a two-time Pac-12 Pitcher of the Year who has led the nation in shutouts in each of the past two seasons.

"Jolene is one of the top pitchers in the nation," Ninemire said. "She's a real workhorse out there for our team. She'll throw as many games and as many innings as we need her to throw.

"She's the most durable pitcher I've ever had on this team. She doesn't tire. She just keeps going, no matter how tired she is. She's just highly motivated. She has an unbelievable work ethic. She's in great shape. I think the more she throws, the better she gets. She is going to have plenty of opportunity this year to pitch a number of games."

Arioto was also an accomplished pitcher - She started 24 games last season and went 20-3 with a 1.32 ERA. This year, the Bears don't have an experienced No. 2 starter. Sophomore Nikki Owens and freshmen Nisa Ontiveros and Taylor Lee will compete to give Henderson a break from the circle from time to time.

But Henderson and the Bears have been down this road recently. One of the reasons Henderson led the nation in innings pitched in 2011 is because Arioto missed the season with a broken leg. Without any other viable options, Henderson ended up starting 40 of Cal's 45 games.

"My freshman year, I wanted to strike everybody out," Henderson said. "I've improved mentally a lot. I started thinking about what I can control instead of trying to control everything. I've read a lot of mind books. Everyone in college is so good. The mental side can give you an edge."

Despite the loss of some firepower, the Bears still have threats up and down their lineup. Junior Britt Vonk is Cal's all-time leader in batting average (.380). Sophomore right fielder Breana Kostreba was selected to the Pac-12 All-Freshman Team last year after batting .294 with 13 home runs and 42 RBI. Third baseman Danielle Henderson, Jolene's younger sister, had 16 homers and was second on the team with 101 total bases last year.

"The attitude this year is we got there last year but now we want to win it," Ziegenhirt said. "Not that we didn't want to win it last year, but this year were even more motivated because we came so close. It's really exciting to establish your own legacy. We can use the legacy of all the years before, but every year is a new team and brings something different and exciting for the season."

The Bears' first assignment this weekend will come against Kentucky at 10:30 a.m. PT on Friday. Cal is also slated to play Cal State Northridge, No. 14 Florida and Indiana.

This edition takes a look at the Cal men's swim team.