Vikings Volleyball No Match for Defending Champs

The highly anticipated rematch of the 2009 Nassau County Championship had the makings of a great match between two Long Island volleyball powerhouses, but the Plainview JFK Hawks took three straight games 25-19, 25-22, and 25-22, and walked away with a big win over the Schreiber Vikings on Tuesday.

"I'm disappointed with our energy and effort today," senior tri-captain Adam Epstein said after the loss. "We came out flat and we never got over it."

The Vikings trailed the entire first game and head coach Maria Giamanco had to take two timeouts to settle her team down.

Tri-captain Dan Bernstein echoed Epstein's thoughts.

"We didn't come ready to play," Bernstein said. "Our warm ups were pretty lackadaisical and we weren't going through the motions 100 percent. I think that carried over into the game. There was just no energy."

The second game was as back and forth as it gets. The Vikings trailed by as many as four points and led by as many as three, but the Hawks eventually took the game behind the strong play of middle hitter Steven Coniglio.

Coniglio finished the match with 16 kills and three blocks for Plainview JFK.

The beginning of the third game featured more back and forth play, however, the Hawks eventually ran away with the game due to a few miscues from the Vikings.

"We weren't ready to play defense, we weren't ready to play offense, and we were slow," Bernstein said.

Giamanco took six timeouts throughout the course of the game, suggesting that the Vikings weren't sticking to their game plan.

"We talked about this and we try and work on it in practice: our blocking and defense on tips," Epstein said. "We just didn't execute today and it led to our defeat."

After starting the season 4-0, the Vikings have now dropped three straight matches to two of the stronger schools in Nassau County: Plainview JFK and the Massapequa Chiefs. But the losses are coming at a time when the Vikings can learn from their mistakes.

"I think it's good that we had Plainview and Massapequa in our past few games because it's those two teams that are going to give us some competition and I think it was a nice wake up call," Bernstein said. "It shows us that we need to step up our game because our goal is obviously to win the county championship and we've lost to these two teams."

While the last few matches have not gone the Vikings' way, the future still looks very bright.

"We've got to pick it up in every aspect of the game, especially teamwork," Bernstein added. "But I think for the rest of the season we'll be pretty successful."

The Vikings will look to snap their skid against Oceanside at home on Thursday at 4:30 p.m.