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The Rice Thresher
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by Chris Larson thresher editorial staff If the volleyball team can cut down the time it needs to warm up, the Owls could be headed for a successful year. The Owls played in their second tournament of the season last weekend at the Golden Bear Invitational in Berkeley, Calif. In the Owls' season-opening home tournament, they struggled in a five-game win over Samford University. The first-match jitters struck again Sept. 7 when the Owls began tournament play against the University of Tennessee, and, facing a better team than Samford, the Owls couldn't recover. Serving made the difference in game one as the Owls made four service errors and failed to receive the serve three times, allowing Tennessee to roll to a 30-21 win. "We were very tentative at the start," head coach Julio Morales said. "We missed too many serves, and they started out serving very, very strong. We didn't get our passing quite up to speed until later." Games two and three were much closer, but costly Rice errors near the end of the games gave the Volunteers 30-28 and 30-26 victories. Rice out-hit Tennessee .314 to .186 in the final game, but still couldn't pull out the win as the Volunteers closed the match with a 10-3 run. "We didn't play well against Tennessee, although our numbers and their numbers were basically the same," Morales said. "We bunched our errors, which basically made us lose the last two games, although they were close." In Saturday's third-place game, the Owls swept Florida Atlantic University 30-23, 30-25, 30-21 to move to 4-3 for the season. Rice's defense held FAU's hitting percentage under .100 in all three games. Although FAU (0-6) is still searching for its first win this season, the Owls said what mattered most was how they played as a team, regardless of who was on the other side of the net. "Saturday we were a completely different team than we've been all season," senior outside hitter Leigh Leman said. "We got everything together, played as a team, had fun and just dominated the entire match. If we can be that same team for the rest of the season we'll do very well." The Owls were scheduled to leave today for the Lady Tiger Invitational at Louisiana State University, but Athletics Director Bobby May, President Malcolm Gillis and head coaches decided that Rice teams would not compete this weekend as a result of Tuesday's terrorist attack on the United States (See Story, Page 1). "It's a thing beyond volleyball," he said. "On our side, it has to do with the uncertainty about what may happen between now and Saturday. LSU is going to find out their possibilities and then get back to at least us and one other team and see if we can run [the tournament] some other time." Tuesday, the Owls travel to San Marcos to play Southwest Texas State University in what may be their last match before they begin Western Athletic Conference play Sept. 27 at Boise State University. Morales said his team is developing into a working unit. Junior Mariel Davenport Pollock has been serving as the principal setter. Sophomore Rebekah Neal, who began the season as a possible setter, has moved to outside hitter and collected a team-high 10 kills against FAU. "We're finally figuring it out better on the court," Morales said. "For now, [Rebekah]'s playing the right side with the option of setting, and for everything it's working better that way."
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