M. Spikers Have Tough Year

Coming off of a season led by underclassmen and a second place finish in the Ivy League, one would think that the Harvard men's volleyball team would be sitting pretty in 1994-5.

But the Crimson's hopes of an league title were shattered in the Ivy League Tournament. Princeton won the best-of-three final, and Harvard went home with a 14-14 record and without its championship.

The loss to Princeton followed a day of disappointment for the Crimson.

"We didn't play well except against Cornell," junior Ryan Westendorf said following the tournament. "We may have looked past [some of our early opponents]."

The Crimson's poor play was partially a result of coach Ihsan Gurdal's strategy of resting the starters for the more important matches. Gurdal had anticipated a strenuous day and decided to play the starters only sparingly.

This strategy came back to haunt the Harvard in its second and third games of the tournament. In the second round, against Dartmouth the Crimson dropped game two before rallying to finish off the Big Green.

In the third round, Harvard had trouble against the Elis of Yale. The match went to the final game before the Crimson were able to prevail.

The next round was the only round that Harvard deemed as successful. The Crimson routed Cornell on route to the finals against Princeton.

Those finals proved to be a disappointment for Harvard.

"I don't think we blocked a single ball against Princeton," senior Ned Staebler said following the loss to Princeton. "But we couldn't expect to do that well [based on our previous matches that day]."

The tournament was symbolic of the entire season for Harvard.

"We'd play well for a bit and then lose our concentration," Westendorf said following the tournament. "That pretty much been the story for us all season."

Despite a seemingly successful season that concluded with a second place finish in the Ivy League, the Crimson did not seem content with the season.

"It's hard to call it a disappointment," Westendorf said. "But, we certainly didn't do what we wanted to do."

However, Harvard can look forward to improving on this season's second place finish, since the team only loses two seniors and one starter.

"We should have a good team next year. We are only losing two seniors and one starter," said Westendorf. "We have a lot of returning starters, lots of good freshman, and supposedly a good recruiting class."

Staebler, one of the departing seniors, echoed Westendorf's sentiment.

"We were a young team the year," said Staebler after the season, "Next year, they're going to be very good."