Matadors Claim Come-From-Behind Win

PROVO -- After the first two games of Saturday's MPSF men's volleyball match, it looked as if the Cougars would make easy work of fifth-ranked Cal State Northridge for the second straight night. However, just as BYU head coach Tom Peterson had predicted they might, the Matadors caught fire and fought back from a two-game deficit to upend the Cougars, 29-31, 23-30, 30-20, 30-22, 15-13.

The victory marked the first win for CS Northridge in Provo since the 1996 season.

"There isn't much to say," Peterson said. "We should have won that match tonight. Our inexperience showed up at the wrong time. We'll have to make this one up on the road. You can't lose at home in this league and expect to win the championship."

The Cougars jumped out to an early 2-0 lead in the match, thanks in part to senior Joe Hillman who collected a team-leading 10 kills in the first two games, including seven in game one. Newcomer Victor Batista and veteran Jonathan Alleman made things tough on the Matadors in games one and two, recording three blocks each.

In game one, BYU hit .312, recording 16 kills on 32 attempts. In the following match, things started looking even better, improving its hitting percentage to .346 on 14-of-26 attempts.

Then, in game three, following a BYU service error that gave the Matadors a 3-2 lead, CS Northridge took off and didn't look back. CSUN built a nine-point advantage after a Brian Waite kill gave the Matadors a 19-10 lead. The Cougars chopped away at the lead, but could get no closer than a six-point deficit. With a couple late kills from Nils Nielsen and a James Lischer block, the Matadors climbed back to a 10-point advantage, winning game three, 30-20.

"Every team in this league is good," Peterson said. "They [CSUN] started passing well and their offense started making plays. The problem was, we didn't jump on them when we needed to jump on them. That's something we talked about, but we weren't able to do it when we needed to. We had guys who, unfortunately, weren't ready to play tonight."

The Cougars hit just .265 in game three, connecting on 16-of-34 attempts with a seven errors.

Game four was much more of the same. The Matadors committed just three errors on 23 attempts at the net, while the Cougars' hitting percentage started heading in the wrong direction. BYU hit just .182 in game four, recording a match-high 10 errors on 16-of-33 attempts.

The Cougars lost the lead at 4-5 when Wait collected one of his 13 kills on the night. As in game three, CS Northridge built a sizeable lead before the Cougars made a late charge. Fernando Pessoa notched one of his team-leading 18 kills to cut the CSUN lead to just three at 16-19. The Matadors, however, poured it on and claimed the eight-point win after a BYU serving error to force a fifth and deciding game.

Things looked good for BYU in the final game of the match, climbing to a sizeable four-point lead, 8-4, on one of Alleman's 16 kills on the night. With the Cougars holding a three-point lead at 12-9, the matched seemed within reach. However, Doug English pounded one home to start a 3-0 run for the Matadors. A BYU attack error evened the score at 12-12. But Cory Carpenter gave BYU back the lead on one of his season-high six kills. On the very next play, CS Northridge came up with a big block to even things back up at 13-13.

The match ended on back-to-back attack errors, giving the Matadors the hard-fought, five-game victory.

"Everyone had their moments tonight," Peterson concluded. "We just didn't get better at the right times. Tonight was a big let down. I don't know if we are unable to focus for six straight games--our inexperience really showed up tonight."

With the loss, the Cougars drop to 1-3 (1-1) on the season, while Cal State Northridge improves to 4-2 (1-1).

The Cougars will take to the road for the next two weeks, traveling to Ohio State on Jan. 23-24. BYU will also trip to Long Beach State for a two-match MPSF series against the 49'ers on Jan. 28 and Jan. 29.


                              Volleyball Box Score
                        2004 BYU Men's Volleyball Stats
  Cal State Northridge vs BRIGHAM YOUNG (Jan 17, 2004 at Brigham Young Univ.)
    Cal State Northridge   |     ATTACK      |SET| SERVE |SRV|DEF|  BLOCK |GEN
 ## Name                 GP|  K   E  TA   PCT|  A| SA  SE| RE|DIG|BS BA BE|BHE
 -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 2  NIELSEN, Nils.......  4| 13   5  29  .276|  0|  1   2|  1|  4| 1  1  0|  0
 4  WAITE, Brian........  5| 13   1  23  .522|  0|  0   4|  1|  2| 1  6  0|  0
 5  DOUGLAS, Stan.......  2|  5   2  10  .300|  0|  0   1|  0|  0| 0  0  1|  0
 6  TRAMBLIE, Ty........  5|  0   1   4 -.250| 56|  0   0|  0|  5| 0  4  0|  0
 7  RHODES, Dan.........  2|  3   6  10 -.300|  1|  0   2|  0|  3| 0  1  0|  0
 10 TAYLOR, Jeff........  5| 16   2  27  .519|  0|  0   4|  0|  5| 1  1  1|  0
 3  LISCHER, James......  4|  5   1  11  .364|  0|  1   1|  0|  1| 0  3  0|  0
 8  HANSON, Cary........  2|  4   3   9  .111|  0|  0   2|  0|  1| 0  0  0|  0
 11 ALLEN, Nate.........  1|  0   0   0  .000|  0|  0   1|  0|  0| 0  0  0|  0
 12 ENGLISH, Doug.......  5|  1   0   1 1.000|  1|  0   0|  0|  7| 0  0  0|  0
 15 ALLEN, Billy........  3|  0   0   0  .000|  3|  0   0|  0|  0| 0  0  0|  0
 16 AMESON, Scott.......  4|  5   3  12  .167|  0|  1   1|  0|  3| 0  2  0|  0
 -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Totals..............  5| 65  24 136  .301| 61|  3  18|  2| 31| 3 18  2|  0
 TEAM ATTACK PER GAME                               TOTAL TEAM BLOCKS: 12.0
 Game  K  E  TA   Pct
   1  17  7  33  .303   GAME SCORES           1  2  3  4  5  TEAM RECORDS
   2  12  8  32  .125   Cal State Northridge 29 23 30 30 15  4 - 2
   3  16  4  32  .375   BRIGHAM YOUNG....... 31 30 20 22 13  1 - 3
   4  12  3  23  .391
   5   8  2  16  .375
    BRIGHAM YOUNG          |     ATTACK      |SET| SERVE |SRV|DEF|  BLOCK |GEN
 ## Name                 GP|  K   E  TA   PCT|  A| SA  SE| RE|DIG|BS BA BE|BHE
 -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
 5  MORENO, Carlos......  5|  6   3  14  .214| 60|  1   5|  0|  6| 1  2  0|  0
 6  FERRE, Aaron........  2|  0   2   2-1.000|  0|  0   2|  0|  1| 0  1  0|  0
 10 CARPENTER, Cory.....  5|  6   5  13  .077|  0|  0   5|  0|  0| 0  4  1|  0
 11 HILLMAN, Joe........  4| 13   5  26  .308|  0|  0   2|  0|  1| 0  1  0|  0
 12 ALLEMAN, Jonathan...  5| 16   7  35  .257|  1|  0   2|  1|  5| 0  5  1|  0
 17 PESSOA, Fernando....  5| 18   4  28  .500|  4|  0   3|  2| 10| 0  4  0|  0
 13 EVANS, Taylor.......  4|  6   5  14  .071|  1|  0   0|  0|  2| 0  1  0|  0
 14 NEILSON, Rob........  4|  0   0   0  .000|  0|  0   0|  0|  0| 0  0  0|  0
 15 OLMSTEAD, Shawn.....  5|  0   0   0  .000|  2|  0   0|  0|  7| 0  0  0|  0
 18 BATISTA, Victor.....  5|  6   0   7  .857|  0|  1   2|  0|  2| 0  6  1|  0
 19 CARDONA, Enoc.......  1|  1   3   6 -.333|  0|  0   2|  0|  0| 0  0  0|  0
 -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Totals..............  5| 72  34 145  .262| 68|  2  23|  3| 34| 1 24  3|  0
 TEAM ATTACK PER GAME                               TOTAL TEAM BLOCKS: 13.0
 Game  K  E  TA   Pct
   1  16  6  32  .312   Site: Brigham Young Univ. (Smith Fieldhouse)
   2  14  5  26  .346   Date: Jan 17, 2004   Attend: 2441   Time: 2H 15M
   3  16  7  34  .265   Referees: BURT FULLER, MAILE JEWKES
   4  16 10  33  .182
   5  10  6  20  .200