Matadors Make Short Work of 4 Opponents in Santa Barbara

Every year the UC Santa Barbara Collegiate Volleyball Invitational provides a great opportunity for teams to experiment with their lineups without fear of losing because matches don’t count toward season records.

The NCAA requires that volleyball matches be best of five games and the Santa Barbara event has a best of three format.

But the 24-team tournament couldn’t have come at a better time for the Cal State Northridge men’s volleyball team, which has two new foreign players who figure to eventually play key roles.

“This is real good for us because it’s giving us a chance to play a lot of different people,” Northridge Coach John Price said. “Right now we need that opportunity.”

Mikko Sivonen, a 6-foot-3 setter from Finland, and Dirk Schlueter, a 6-9 middle blocker from Germany, saw plenty of action in the Matadors’ five matches Friday.

Sivonen, who arrived in Los Angeles two weeks ago, should challenge Pierce College transfer Dan Nash for the starting position.

Schlueter, who has been in the U.S. for less than a week, is a shoo-in starter once the regular season gets underway, Price said.

The Matadors cruised through their first pool, defeating Buffalo, 15-10, 15-4; UC Santa Cruz, 15-7, 15-5, and seventh-ranked USC, 17-15, 15-8.

Northridge, ranked ninth, beat Arizona State, 15-6, 15-8, in a second-round pool match and lost to Santa Barbara, 15-5, 15-11. The Matadors play Loyola Marymount at 9 a.m. today.

“I like this tournament a lot,” Schlueter said. “I like playing many matches in a day. It’s good for the team.”

Nine schools from the powerful Mountain Pacific Sports Federation are competing in the tournament, which includes seven of the country’s top 10 teams, including No. 2 Long Beach State, No. 3 Santa Barbara, No. 4 Stanford, No. 5 UCLA and No. 10 Pepperdine.

Pepperdine went undefeated in its first pool. The Waves’ toughest match was a 15-11, 14-16, 15-10 victory over Indiana-Purdue Ft. Wayne.

Pepperdine held a 14-12 lead in the second game, but the Mastodons fought off three match points and went on a 4-0 run to send the match into the rally-scoring tie-breaker.

“We were waiting in Game 2 for Indiana to lose it and we learned that’s not the way to do it,” Pepperdine Coach Marv Dunphy said. “You learn from adversity.”

The Waves also beat Chico State, 15-10, 15-3 and Westmont, 15-10, 15-8, in their first pool. Pepperdine opened the second round with a 14-16, 15-7, 15-12 victory over Pacific. The Waves will face California today at 10:30 a.m.

Dunphy said he skipped the Collegiate Invitational for several years until last season because it’s a physically grueling event for players and he prefers to compete in regular matches instead of the shortened format.

“But we have such a young team that this is good for us,” he said. “We want to be in as many situations as we can so we can learn before playing regular matches.”