Down two games to one, the Crimson fought back to tie NYU at 26 in an extremely tight fourth game, igniting the boisterous Harvard crowd. But several crucial kills from the Violets’ outside hitter Evan Finch—who led NYU with 19 kills, 10 digs and five blocks—sealed the Crimson’s fate, as the Violets just managed to eke out the two-point margin of victory necessary in rally scoring.
While overall Harvard hung close with the talented NYU squad, the team was unable to pull off the upset.
The third game saw the Crimson grab the first point before NYU kicked its game into gear, rolling off a seven-point run which put Harvard in a hole it could not climb out of.
“That’s the match. You can’t give up points and runs in this game when it’s so close,” said Harvard coach Rob Keller.
It was at the end of the Violets’ convincing spurt that Harvard’s high emotions began to boil over. After a questionable call at the net extended NYU’s lead to 9-2 in the third game, Keller—who had already received a yellow card for arguing with the officials in the second game—quickly jumped off the bench. He was greeted with a red card and automatic ejection for the rest of the game.
“I can honestly say it was the worst officiating I’ve ever seen. It messes with my guys’ confidence, and I think it’s really bad for the game of volleyball when guys call really erratic matches. You don’t know what’s good and what’s bad, and then you start second-guessing,” Keller said.
The red card and ejection of Keller seemed to pump up the already highly-motivated Crimson team, which went on an 8-3 run to close to within two of the Violets.
“That’s really what I was trying to do, get [the team] jump-started,” Keller said. “It seems they responded.”
But NYU was able to weather Harvard’s emotional response, and steadily pulled away for the five-point win. Finch was assisted by outside hitters Macnair Sillick and Michael Moser, who tallied 15 and 11 kills respectively for the Violet attack.
The Crimson had started the match with a burst of energy and captured the first game thanks in part to the superior play of Marouf and McKiernan.
“We came out fired up...we couldn’t keep that same fire the whole game, but our intensity was high. Just a few more breaks here and there, and we would have been in the [fifth] game,” said McKiernan, whose hard-hitting kills kept Harvard close throughout the match.
NYU quickly dampened the Crimson’s fire in the second game. Two straight blocks of attempted kills by McKiernan sent the Violets on a 17-9 run, capped by a debatable net call that incensed Keller and resulted in the yellow card.
The loss was especially disappointing because it represented a missed opportunity for Harvard to send the league a message by giving NYU its first EIVA defeat. In addition, this loss most likely means that the Crimson will not have the quality wins necessary to move up to a higher division next year.
“I don’t think I’ve been in an athletic game that was as tough as that loss was,” McKiernan said. “We had some stretches where we didn’t play our best ball, but that last game we really turned it on. I’m disappointed.”