Menges played outside hitter and setter in Scates' 6-2 offense, and by his sophomore year in 1972 he had earned a spot in the starting rotation.
The two teams favored to win the national championship were the UC Santa Barbara Gauchos and the Aztecs of San Diego State.
The Bruins earned an at-large bid and traveled to Muncie, Indiana for the 1972 national tournament held at Ball State University.
The format of the tournament at the time consisted of a four-team preliminary round robin to determine seeding into a subsequent single-elimination championship bracket.
UCLA, UC Santa Barbara and UCSD all ended up with 2 - 1 records, but the Bruins were given the top position in the playoff seeding on the basis of points differential.
UCLA met San Diego State at the regional finals in Pauley Pavilion in a rematch of the 1972 national championship match.
Many of the Bruin kills were coming from an inside attack, with UCLA's Bob Leonard receiving fast tempo sets from Menges.
[7] He commonly played with and against Tom Chamales, who had graduated a year before him from Santa Monica High, and Randy Niles.
On the 1974 beach volleyball circuit Menges advanced to the finals of 4 events, winning 2 times, once with Chamales and once with Ron Von Hagen.
In the mid-1970s, the beach volleyball tour consisted of 12 tournaments played up and down the southern California coast, from San Diego in the south to Santa Cruz in the north.
"[1] In the mid to late 1970s, the team of Menges and Lee was the most dominant pairing on the beach volleyball scene.
[10][11] Their record of 13 Open wins in a row stood for 16 years until tied by the pair of Karch Kiraly and Kent Steffes.
Partner changes are common in Pro Beach Volleyball, and Menges played with many of the game's top players.
Besides Ron Von Hagen and Greg Lee mentioned above, Menges partnered extensively in 1977 with Chris Marlow, and later with Matt Gage.
[16] Menges also won tournaments pairing with Tom Chamales, Gary Hooper and Jon Stevenson.
[1][7] All told during his 13-year career Menges entered 75 Open tournaments, advancing to the finals 62 times, and winning 48 events.
[18] Menges won the Manhattan five times,[19] winning titles in 1975 and 1978 with Greg Lee, in 1977 with Chris Marlowe, in 1979 with Sinjin Smith and in 1981 with Randy Stoklos.
[23][24] During the late 1990s and 2000s, he became involved in coaching beach volleyball players and helped Jose Loiola and Emanuel Rego become the first team to qualify for the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, Australia.
Like Lang and Von Hagen before him, and Smith and Stoklos after, Menges would defeat teams with a concentration and intensity that never faltered throughout two and three hour contests.
If teams altered their tactic and served Lee, Menges would set perfectly and play an intense, ball hawking defense.
[17] Menges excelled at the mental and physical skills of two man beach volleyball, and these enabled him to dominate the game and define an era of the sport.