SAN FRANCISCO -- Brittany Hochevar knew that picking a defined role would help her development as a beach volleyball player. But even she didn't realize how quickly that improvement might come.

For Hochevar and her new partner, Jennifer Fopma, the AVP Crocs Tour San Francisco represents just their eighth tournament together after joining forces in July. And the pair, seeded 11th out of 12 teams in the women's bracket, recorded one of its most impressive victories, a 21-15, 33-31 first-round decision over the No. 6 seeds, Tyra Turner and Rachel Wacholder.

"Was that as fun to watch as it was to play?" Hochevar asked reporters. "Because that was a blast."

It was made more fun by the realization that Hochevar, a 27-year-old from Long Beach State, and Fopma, a 26-year-old who played at Pepperdine and Cal State Northridge, are just scratching the surface of their potential.

"That was a great match for us, because we're the 11th seed in this tournament," Fopma said. "Going against a higher seed, there's almost nothing to lose. You've just got to go for it and not hold back. I think it worked pretty well."

Fopma, 6-foot-3, has cycled through a few different partners after splitting from longtime friend and former high school and college teammate Stacy Rouwenhorst midway through last season. She had been trying to team with Hochevar for a few weeks before the pair came together for the AVP Crocs Tour stop in Boulder, Colo. over the Fourth of July weekend.

Hochevar, 6-0, wasn't willing to commit, however, until she figured out which position she wanted to play after unsatisfying stints switching between defender and blocker with Logan Tom and Keao Burdine.

"I was doing a lot of splitting responsibilities, and I just felt that I wasn't getting into the flow of the game as well as I could have,"

Hochevar said. "Finally, I made the call that playing defense is way more fun for me than blocking, and so I went and tried to find someone bigger and badder and could take up a lot of court for me at the net."

On the one hand, you could argue the inexperience of Fopma and Hochevar showed when the pair needed 10 match points to close out the match. But the only way to gain experience is to keep winning matches, and Fopma and Hochevar showed the requisite perseverance in keeping up the pressure until they finally finished off Turner and Wacholder.

"We're still working out the kinks. We're still learning to move with each other," Hochevar said. "It's been a blast, though. I mean, if we're having success at this stage of our partnership, we're pretty excited about it."

Fopma and Hochevar had a late match Friday against third-seeded Nicole Branagh and Elaine Youngs. A victory there or in the contender's bracket on Saturday would clinch a spot among the eight guaranteed berths in the AVP Crocs Cup Shootout finale in Manhattan Beach next week. Otherwise, they'll have to fight their way through "the uber qualifier," as Hochevar described it, for a shot at part of the record $1 million total purse.

"I didn't know that was the format for Manhattan until we showed up here," Fopma said. "I just thought, 'Oh, this'll be a great tournament, we'll get a good finish, we'll get ready for Manhattan.'"

So now it's a little bit in the back of your head, but like Brittany said, "It's just one point at a time."