The BYU men’s volleyball team played its final game of the 2011 season last weekend, wrapping up another successful year for the Cougars.
The men’s volleyball team played its final game of the season last weekend.
The No. 2 ranked men’s team won 23 of its 28 games this season.
“We had a great season and we had a great run, but obviously it didn’t end the way we had hoped,” said interim head coach Rob Neilson. “We had the potential to play for the national championship being the number two ranked team in the country for most of the season.”
The No. 2 Cougars took a tough loss against No. 7 UC Santa Barbara last weekend in the quarterfinal round of the 2011 MSPF tournament.
“We struggled to find a rhythm tonight,” said Neilson in a news release, as he described the Cougars’ loss in four sets (21-25, 25-23, 24-26, 22-25) to the Gauchos.
“Santa Barbara was playing to win the game, and we were playing not to loose,” said junior Robb Stowell. “Our mindset was not where it should have been.”
Aside from the devastating loss, many exciting events happened this year for the Cougars.
BYU middle attacker Futi Tavana was voted inaugural winner of the Off-the-Block Blocker of the Year.
Taylor Sander was named Freshman of the Year and was also included on the All-MPSF First Team and All-MPSF Freshman Team.
Stowell and Futi Tavana were also named to the All-MPSF First Team and setter Joe Kauliakamoa received ALL-MSPF Honorable Mention honors.
“One of the things about life is that you learn from the failures that you have along the way, sometimes it is really hard, but we learn from our mistakes and improve from there,” Neilson said. “We are looking to learn and progress for next year.”
Being concentrated on the process of improving everyday is the new focus of Neilson, who is still being interviewed for being the head coach of next year’s 2012 season.
“Our team has probably been the closest knit team I have been with in my BYU career,” said senior Alex DaPron. “Even though we didn’t accomplish our overall goal of national champions, I feel like we had a great season.”
