Men's Volleyball: Pair of league defeats threatens playoff hopes

Saturday’s match against the Pioneers (7-11, 3-4) was dominated by outside hitter Michael Kvidahl, who recorded a team record of 10 service aces. The junior, who also had eight kills, was the driving factor behind George Mason’s 26-24, 25-17, 25-15 victory.

“George Mason put a lot of pressure on us with their serve, and we didn’t have an answer,” junior middle blocker Michael Dye said.

The Tigers also struggled with their passing and serve-receiving, clearly frustrated by frequent miscommunication on the court. Sophomore outside hitter Davis Waddell pointed to those passing problems as playing an important role in the Tigers’ inability to overcome the Pioneers’ leads.

“It is hard to side out consistently when you’re struggling with your passing,” he said.

Princeton worked hard throughout the match to come back, closing the gap to 24-24 in the first set before losing on errors by Dye and senior setter Scott Liljestrom. The Tigers had another chance to get back late in the third set and narrowed the visitors’ lead to one point at 15-14, but the team could not build on its momentum, as Kvidahl went on an eight-point serving streak to close out the match.

“We simply weren’t playing as well as we are capable of playing,” Liljestrom said. “Our serving was pretty bad, and we had multiple opportunities to take control of that game that we failed to capitalize on.”

Freshman outside hitter Cody Kessel led the team once again, recording 13 kills and five digs, while freshman libero Tony Ensbury added six digs. Waddell and sophomore outside hitter Jeff Stapleton had eight and six kills, respectively, and Liljestrom had 29 assists.

The loss was particularly a tough one after NJIT (7-10, 3-2) dropped Princeton 25-21, 21-25, 25-21, 25-20 the day earlier.

“I think we got out to a slow start against NJIT, which hurt us,” Stapleton noted.

The Tigers played more cohesively as a team on Friday, with Waddell pointing to middle blockers Dye and freshman Will Siroky as key players who controlled the pace of the match.

“[Mike and Will] did a great job of drawing NJIT’s attention, which opened me up to hit lots of different shots from the outside,” Waddell said. “Scott also did a great job of giving me the ball in situations where I knew I could score.”

Individually, the Tigers once again put up impressive statistics: Kessel recorded 18 kills and Waddell added a career high of 13. Liljestrom contributed 46 assists. Princeton played well on the defensive end as well, as Stapleton had three blocks and Dye recorded four.

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Princeton will try to regain its position in the top four with matches later in the month against St. Francis and EIVA leader Penn State.

“We are still a very dangerous team. The losses this weekend were disappointing, but we still have our end goal in sight,” Kessel said. “We take things away from every match, win or lose, and we just need to make sure we are putting in the effort to improve every day.”

“It means we have three weeks to train hard to make sure we prove ourselves in the EIVA,” Dye added.

The Tigers will need to play strong despite losing yet another player to an injury; sophomore middle blocker Brad Howard did not play this weekend because of an injured foot, and his return time is unknown.

“I would love to contribute down the [stretch], but if I can’t, I really don’t think it will play a factor in whether or not we make the playoffs,” Howard said. “I know after this weekend we are going to push ourselves harder every day so we reach our goal of playing Penn State in the EIVA finals.”