It's playoff time, BABY! Don't tell Dickie V., or men's volleyball fans will have to start looking out for flying spittle in addition to the occasional stray spike.
The volleyball team (15-10) will travel to Juniata College (17-7) this Saturday night in the first round of the Eastern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association postseason playoffs. The winner will move on to face top-seeded Penn State in the EIVA Final Four, a daunting task that undoubtedly has both squads focusing their attention on each other. Though the Eagles defeated the Tigers in four games during both of their meetings this season, the outcome of this match-up is by no means decided.
Princeton is more prepared for this match now than it has been all year.
The Tiger roster features only one senior, opposite Dennis Alshuler, and only two juniors, setter Jason Liljestrom and libero Tommy Mandecki. Princeton relies heavily on its sophomores and freshmen, meaning that the squad has had to go through significant growing pains over the course of the year.
However, under the leadership of captains Alshuler and Liljestrom, the frequency of mental errors has decreased sharply in recent games. After the Tigers' recent 3-0 sweep of EIVA second seed George Mason University, it became clear that Princeton's record may not do justice to where the team is right now. One prime example of this trend is freshman middle Brian Hamming, who for his near-perfect performance in last week's match with NJIT was named Princeton's only EIVA Player of the Week this year.
The two games with Juniata, although big victories for the Eagles on the surface, were actually incredibly close. Every match between the two squads is hotly contested, to the point where the Eagles won only by the minimum margin of two points in each game the last time the two met.
The squads are relatively even height-wise, with Princeton clinging to a slight advantage according to roster heights that could disappear if the Eagles all wear an extra pair of socks. The teams' inter-conference records were exactly the same as well: 7-7.
It is, in fact, only due to the whims of fate that Juniata is the host for this match at all. Star sophomore outside hitter Blake Robinson was ill and did not play in the team's most recent game against Rutgers-Newark, the match that dropped the Tigers to 7-7 and to the fifth instead of fourth playoff spot. Had Robinson played, Princeton could very well have won that match (the team lost 3-2), and Juniata's wins in the regular season would seem rather inconsequential.
If the match is indeed up for grabs, however, the Tigers still need to go out and win it. To do so, the team will need to overcome its most frequent woes of the regular season — defense and mental errors.
The mental errors are not expected to be as much of a problem, as the team's progression and development have forced them down significantly.
Defense also figures to be less of a problem, particularly in the area where the team struggled the most before — blocking. The giant Princeton front line, particularly Hamming and fellow middle, sophomore Sean Vitousek, showed in the New Jersey Institute of Technology game just how dominant it can be.
Hamming and Vitousek, two of the players who have developed the most over the year, could be the key factors in the Juniata match. With an average height of six-feet, seven-inches, these two young Tiger big men have been improving with every game this season.
Vitousek has had several excellent blocking performances in a row, a critical statistic for the sometimes defense-deprived Princeton team. At this point, opposing hitters have resorted to tap-hitting after catching so much as a glimpse of his headband and ponytail in the corner of their eye.
Hamming is adjusting quickly to the pace and tactics of Division I college volleyball, as his team-leading .379 season hitting percentage can attest. If he and Vitousek can continue their improvement and capitalize on their progress against the Eagles, there is no reason why the Tigers will not end up facing the Nittany Lions in the EIVA Final Four on April 24th.
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