Concordia tops men's volleyball, hands Tigers first league loss

For the men's volleyball team, swapping coasts is like changing serves — the Tigers go from one end to the other from time to time, but are well aware that they will be heading back in the near future.

The change of coasts will always be a factor for any volleyball team, but a recent rule change might make the change of serves considerably less of a factor.

Tuesday night, the Tigers finally returned home after a long stint on the West Coast and a brief visit to Massachusetts. The opponent that awaited them at Dillon Gym was their first Eastern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association opponent, Concordia.

The Clippers (8-1 overall, 3-0 EIVA Tait Division) proved to be a bit more than the still-developing Tigers (2-3, 1-1) could handle, winning in four games, 30-26, 27-30, 30-27, 30-25.

Princeton's captain, senior outside Steve Cooper, led the Tigers with 15 kills, thanks in part to freshman setter Jason Liljestrom's 43 assists. Junior middle Gary Chern gathered the most digs with seven.

Concordia was expected to be a force in the EIVA this year, as its 3-0 league record seems to support. Though they start four new players, each one of the newcomers is a powerful recruit. The Clippers did win the match decisively, but the game scores bear witness to the fact that the victory was far from dominant. For Princeton, though the team members were disappointed with the loss, the outcome was nonetheless encouraging.

"It was good from the point that we definitely could beat them," freshman setter Jason Liljestrom said. "They were playing solidly, but when we were playing our best, then we would win points. Every game was close toward the end. If any given two points go a different way, we could have won."

Liljestrom's teammate, senior middle Ryan Black, also found promise in some parts of the contest, but was not quite so positive.

"We knew they had a lot of tough guys," Black said. "They were good last year, but we definitely could have beaten that team. This was probably the worst I've played since I've been at Princeton."

Liljestrom pointed out that the majority of Princeton's poor play resulted not from any lack of talent, but from lapses in focus. Wandering Tiger minds resulted in sudden scoring bursts for Concordia.

At this point in the season, Princeton has been unable to develop the coherence necessary to avoid or overcome these lulls.

After several years of success with Jason Morrow '00 at setter, the Tigers are now having to rely on Liljestrom. Though the team has recognized Liljestrom's talent, it is still having some difficulties taking advantage of his style of play.

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"We're still coming together as a team," Black said. "We're still getting used to the freshman setter; we still haven't had a ton of practices."

One factor that cannot be ignored is the new college volleyball scoring system,which can only inflate problems for a team that is not yet completely unified. Under the old system, a team could only win points when it was serving. If a team made a mistake on its serve, the other team would take control of the serve but would not score a point.

Under the new system, points lost on serve, which were formerly only side-outs, now count toward the score. Given that scoring is so much easier, a team must score 30 points to win a game, rather than the 15 that used to be necessary.

So when a team like Princeton loses focus, even for a moment, it can be very detrimental.

"It feels like I haven't been able to adjust well [to the new scoring system]," senior Ryan Black said. "If you make a stupid mistake in the old system, the other team just got the ball. Stupid mistakes now make a two-point swing. In the old system, there could be a no-point swing."

Having lost a close contest in its first league game, Princeton looks to rebound against a much weaker New Jersey Institute of Technology team Saturday at 3:30 p.m. in Dillon. NJIT is already 0-2 in the league.

"They're not supposed to be all that good this year," Black said.

Given the fact that the Tigers played a Concordia team Black called the second-best team on the East Coast to a tough four-game decision, Princeton should be ready to take advantage of this weaker team by the weekend.