Aggie Men's Volleyball finished Second in Tournament

The USU men's volleyball team finished second to the Alumni team Saturday at the USU Men's Invitational preseason tournament.

The Aggies got off to a slow start in the final round of the tournament after starting off the day beating up their opponents at the net.

USU found themselves down 11-6 early in the first game of the final round but scored four straight points to get back in the game. Down 15-12, USU went on a 7-0 run to put the Aggies in the lead by a score of 19-15. The Alumni answered by scoring six straight points putting them up 21-19. The Aggies would eventually lose the game (their first loss of the tournament) 26-24.

In game 2 USU rallied back from a five-point-deficit to win the game 25-23.

The final game of the tournament would only be played to 15 instead of the normal 25 because it was the third game of the series.

The Aggies once again started out slow and trailed the entire game, losing by a score of 15-12.

The USU Alumni team won the series 2 games to 1 and by doing so won the tournament.

Keenan Atwood said that the Aggies just lost their momentum from the previous best-of-three series against The Breakfast Club in which the Aggies won 2-0.

"We lost the momentum from the match before," said Atwood. "We just made simple mistakes and we had an injured player."

Danny Hoerman dislocated his shoulder in the semi-finals against The Breakfast Club. The injury occured when Hoerman swung his arm to spike the ball said a team representative.

James Meno said the Aggies could've played better but were tired from all of the games played and struggled without Hoerman in the lineup.

"We could've done better," said Meno. " After playing so many games we got tired. Danny (Hoerman) has a good block and we needed that."

"We dominated the rest of the pool. We consider ourselves to be the area," said Lewis.

Craig Wallace attributed the loss to being tired on a few important points of the final game.

Atwood also said that he was pleased with how USU did in the tournament despite finishing second.

"I'm way pleased. Our team played really well," said Atwood.

Darren Lewis said that USU he considers USU to be the best team in the region.

"We just got tired on a coupled of crucial points," said Wallace.

Wallace also said that expectations for this season are very high.

"I think its going to be a good year," said Wallace. "We took sixth in the nation last year. This year we have high hopes with most of our players returning."

The Aggies Started off the tournament sweeping the University of Utah winning both of the games by the score of 25-15.

The Aggies also swept The Breakfast Club two games to none winning the first game 25-19 and the second game 25-23. The Breakfast Club made a bit of a comeback to tighten the score after Hoerman's injury.

USU seemed to have complete control in all of their games preceding the championship round.

With the loss of Hoerman in the middle the team seemed to lose some of its defensive power and never seemed to regain it.

The USU men's volleyball team would like to thank the campus recreation for all of their help in having the tournament this year said Wallace.

"We're very appreciative of Campus rec and their willingness to support club sports," said Wallace.

For more information about the Utah State men's volleyball team students can visit www.usu.edu/mensvb.

The Aggies next game will be held at the University of Utah this Friday at 6 p.m.