Fresno State ventures off to Boulder, Colo. today for its second out-of-state tournament. For the first time since the 2004 season, the Bulldogs will have started the season in back-to-back tournaments on the road.

Fresno State will compete against Cornell, Northern Arizona and host Colorado in the Omni Hotels Colorado Tournament, an event coach Laruen Netherby-Sewell believes will be as competitive as last week’s El Paso Sports Commission Invite. The Bulldogs left last week’s invite with a 2-1 record.

Of the teams playing in this weekend’s tournament, Cornell is the only participant that has yet to kick off the season. Cornell returns four players from last year’s 5-21 season.

“I think it’ll be similar,” Netherby-Sewell said. “We don’t really know much about Cornell because they haven’t started their season yet. But NAU looks very similar to Idaho State and we’re playing another Pac-12 team.”

Both Colorado and Northern Arizona enter this weekend’s tournament with perfect 3-0 season starts.

Northern Arizona enters today’s tournament averaging 13.64 kills per set on .356 hitting percentage in three games.

Colorado started the season at 3-0 for the first time since 2008 after concluding a 2011 campaign that included a 19-game losing streak.

The Buffaloes are playing host this weekend after presenting a well-rounded offensive front during the Aug. 24-25 Sam Houston Invitational. Four Colorado players concluded the tournament with over 20 kills.

Colorado will face off against Fresno State on Saturday, the last day of the tournament.

“We’ve got to work on [defense] if we want to be a complete team,” she said.

“Our offense still looks good. We think it’ll carry us a little bit. But to beat the good teams we definitely need to defend better.”

Defense was an area Netherby-Sewell focused on for this past week’s practices.

“This week we worked a lot on defense,” junior outside hitter Marissa Brand said. “We struggled with that this past weekend at UTEP. We’re really looking to improve on our digging and our blocking, and make that a strength rather than a weakness.”

Senior setter Barbara Alcantara’s 123 assists and junior outside hitter Korrin Wild’s seven serving aces currently lead the Mountain West.

Netherby-Sewell said that today’s tournament would serve as an opportunity for the Bulldogs to build upon certain areas.

“We need our serving and passing game to be consistent,” Netherby-Sewell said. “We need to keep building confidence there. And we need our blocking, our defense and our transition attacking to win us the big matches.

“I think it’s going to be another physical tournament and to win we have to play pretty well.”

After this weekend, the Bulldogs will compete in two more tournaments (one being next weekend’s Fresno State Classic) before commencing conference play.

The Bulldogs start their inaugural season in the Mountain West on Sept. 20 at Boise State.

“We’re going to try and sharpen every part of our game before we open in the Mountain West,” Netherby-Sewell said.