Men's volleyball

Trojans drop season opener

By Ryan Hochgesang
Assistant Sports Editor

The USC men's volleyball team ushered in the Pat Powers era Wednesday night at the North Gym with a loss to Cal State Northridge, 17-16, 15-13, 13-15, 15-7.
The Trojans were plagued by inconsistent play and difficulty with their passing.
However, part of the inconsistency was a result of new USC Coach Powers experimenting and trying some new lineups.
"I think that overall we played well," sophomore Gabe Gardner said. "A couple points go our way and it's a totally different match, even though we threw in a bunch of different lineups with guys in new positions."
Gardner had a match-high 27 kills and hit .408, but he also committed eight service errors.
Senior David Berney and freshman Donald Suxho split time at setter for the Trojans. Berney played the first two games and made 44 assists, while Suxho played the third and fourth games and totaled 26 assists.
"They both played well," Powers said. "It's going to take Donald a while to get used to American ball. It just takes a while to gel with the setters."
Senior Eric Seiffert added 26 kills for USC and hit .422, while Chris Gugliano made 17 kills and a team-high 10 digs.
Omar Rawi led the Trojans with five total blocks, while Trent Brown moved into the staring lineup and hit .316 with nine kills.
Chad Strickland and Collin Smith each had 22 kills for the Matadors.
David Money had a game-high 11 total blocks, while also hitting .421 with 10 kills.
Setter Dan Fisher had a match-high 68 assists for Northridge.
A group effort by the Matadors allowed them to dominate the net, making 22 team blocks compared to only nine for the Trojans.
In addition to Money, Eric Klootwyk had nine block assists and Dan Fisher had one block solo and seven block assists.
"We probably didn't pass as well as we should have," Powers said. "I was also a little disappointed in the way we blocked outside balls.
"We made some pretty good adjustments, because that's only the third day we've been in that lineup."
The first two games were tight battles throughout.
Neither team led by more than three points at any part of the first game. USC took a 16-15 lead but couldn't hold on as Northridge took the game on a Smith spike.
The Trojans opened up a 7-2 lead in the second game, but the Matadors evened it up with a 7-2 run of their own.
The score was again tied, 13-13, before a small Northridge run was capped off by a Klootwyk ace to win the game.
"We just got into some passing trouble, but right now I'm more apt to let players, play out of it rather than pull them," Powers said.
USC was finally able to hold on to a lead in the third game, turning an 11-6 lead into a 15-13 victory that was clinched with a Seiffert spike. The Trojans held Northridge to a .074 hitting percentage in the third game.
However, just when it seemed the momentum had shifted to the side of USC, the fourth game arrived, and with it a completely flat USC team.
Northridge shot out to an 8-0 lead and never looked back. After a brief USC run, the Matadors closed out the match on a block by Money. Northridge hit .517 in the final game.
"There's no explaining that; that's just the game of volleyball," Gardner said. "Sometimes all the breaks go against you and sometimes the other team just grabs the momentum."
This was the second straight year that the Trojans opened their season with a four game loss to the Matadors.
But in 1996, USC did rebound to beat Northridge in five games later in the season.