Untimely mental errors have cost Syracuse close matches all season. The Orange continued to give away easy points last weekend.

Syracuse (10-18, 2-11 Big East) lost a sloppy four-set (25-23, 20-25, 24-26, 19-25) match to St. John’s (19-10, 6-7) on Friday night in the Women’s Building. The Orange’s struggles continued Sunday afternoon in the program’s first match in the Carrier Dome. A sparse crowd of 310 saw Connecticut (17-11, 8-5) sweep Syracuse (22-25, 15-25, 23-25).

Syracuse shifted the matches in its opponents’ favor with unforced errors.

“It’s very simple; they did much less mistakes than we did,” Syracuse head coach Leonid Yelin said after Sunday’s loss.

The Orange fought to take a 20-19 lead in the first set of Sunday’s match against Connecticut when Nicolette Serratore hit a weak serve into the back of teammate Monika Salkute’s head. Connecticut took the lead on the ensuing point after Silvi Uattara drilled a ball past the right sideline. The Huskies won the set as Mattison Quayle’s hit bounced off Melina Violas’ outstretched arms and rolled to the floor.

“As soon as we get a lead we get comfortable and we start to relax,” Serratore said. “We don’t stay on top of things. We’re not thinking about every single little thing we have to do anymore because we are so relaxed, and other teams take advantage of that.”

The errors on Sunday started with serve-receive. Some of them led directly to points for the Huskies. In the second set, Gosia Wlaszczuk’s dig went over the net, setting Quayle up for an easy kill. Wlaszczuk and Serratore both missed dig attempts to give the Huskies aces.

The Orange made 19 attacking errors in the match, while the Huskies only made 14. Connecticut hit at a higher rate than Syracuse in each of the three sets. Hitting inconsistency cost the Orange.

“Basically, their balls were hitting the floor and ours weren’t,” middle blocker Samantha Hinz said.

Syracuse didn’t help its cause on the serve. The Orange made six serving errors throughout the match. Most came in moments when Syracuse was attempting to pull ahead in close sets. The inconsistencies gave Connecticut crucial points and took away most of the momentum the Orange was able to gain.

Syracuse had similar problems in Friday’s match against St. John’s. Although the Orange managed to win the first set in that match, the same story played out in three consecutive set losses.

The Orange hit at only a 0.077 rate in the second set with seven attacking errors. Syracuse made 22 hitting errors and five receiving errors in the match.

The inconsistency and unforced errors have racked up for the Orange this season. Syracuse’s lackluster record is a reflection on the trends that have cost it contested sets. Yelin hopes to see his players improve mentally as the team moves from the Big East to the more competitive Atlantic Coast Conference next season.

“I don’t want to have any excuses; our level of play is not high,” Yelin said. “We’re going next year to a much tougher conference and the mental level has to be way better.”

Published on November 4, 2012 at 11:24 pm

Contact Jacob: jspramuk@syr.edu