M. Volleyball Opens Season With a ‘W’

The Harvard men’s volleyball team appeared a bit rusty in its opening game, but the Crimson’s more balanced and well-rounded squad was nonetheless able to overcome MIT, 3-1 (30-21, 24-30, 30-19, 30-17).

Though the Engineers entered the match a daunting 0-7, their earlier start to the season gave them the initial advantage. The Crimson trailed early in the first game, 4-0.

“We were jittery,” Harvard Coach Tom Wilson said. “We made tons of unforced errors and MIT was playing very well. They were more relaxed.”

Harvard eventually evened the gap, trailing 20-19, and then scored 5 points in a row and ultimately won the opening game, 30-21.

The Crimson was unable to overcome its jitters in time to salvage the second game. Harvard went down 13-1 and never quite caught up. Despite the sarcastic taunting of Harvard fans, saying things like: “Let’s Engineer a Victory” and referring to an MIT player as Tim “I love differential equations” Chan, the Engineers solved the Crimson game and won 30-24.

“We came out fired up,” Harvard senior Justin Denham said. “We were too eager to win, and that affected our performance early on. Our coaches had to remind us to be calm.”

Game three was a seesaw struggle early on. With Harvard leading 12-11, several decisive kills by the 6’7 Denham put the Crimson up for good. Denhams’s blistering spikes seemed to defy the laws of physics, sailing between hapless Engineers. On junior captain Mike Bookman’s serve, Harvard scored several unanswered points, leading the way to a 30-19 victory.

The last game featured fine play by Denham and freshmen Abe Marouf, Will Repun and Juan Ramos. Though close at times, the momentum was clearly in Harvard’s favor. The Crimson closed out the match, winning the final game 30-17.

“We started off a little rusty,” Marouf said. “But we got a lot smoother.”

Marouf led the way with 22 kills. Repun had 17 while Denham had 14.

“The freshmen really stepped up,” Book man said. “The upperclassmen seemed more nervous than the freshmen.”

Marouf, Repun and Ramos fit in perfectly, evidence of great team chemistry even in the first match.

After the first couple of games, it became clear that Harvard was the superior team and the probability of an MIT victory shrank exponentially. After 31 errors in the first two games, the Crimson committed only five in the third. In the fourth, the team’s hitting percentage was an outstanding 70 percent, a model of mathematical precision.

Though MIT is not the loftiest of opponents, the Engineers were a good opener for the Crimson.

“It’s good for us to get our jitters out,” Bookman said. “We have a big weekend coming up, but we didn’t want to look past MIT.”

Wilson was also optimistic, keeping his eyes on a championship.

“We have to play better than we did tonight,” Wilson said. “But we have the personnel to win.”