New Venue, Same Goal - Tigers Head To George Mason Seeking First EIVA Title Since 1998

For two months, George Mason was the story of the EIVA men's volleyball season, while Princeton was the team that went into every match with all the pressure.

On Thursday night, those roles could flip.

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Princeton, once 0-4 in league play despite returning three All-EIVA starters, made a dramatic in-season turnaround to return to the postseason for the seventh time in nine seasons under head coach Sam Shweisky. The Tigers, who drove west on the Pennsylania Turnpike to compete in its previous six EIVA postseasons (and every other one they reached this century), will instead travel south to Fairfax, Va., to face a George Mason team that earned the right to host the playoffs following a 13-1 run through the regular season.

Mason — which swept Princeton this season, though the most recent match was a five-set thriller — will bring the EIVA Player and Head Coach of the Year to the postseason, as well as a league-best six All-EIVA players. The Patriots will also carry the burden of expectations that come with being the regular season champion, while Princeton can start on even ground and not worry about scoreboard-watching.

There will only be one scoreboard Thursday at 7:30, when Princeton faces George Mason in the second semifinal inside the RAC Gym. Second-seeded Penn State will open the postseason hosting third-seeded Harvard at 5 pm, and the winner of the two semifinals will meet Saturday at 7 pm for a berth in the 2018 NCAA Championships. FloVolleyball will broadcast the entire weekend, and links for both live stats and live video are available here.

The four teams involved in the postseason combined to face each other 12 times this season, and six of them — one from every individual matchup — were decided in a fifth set. George Mason defeated Princeton 3-0 during the Tigers' early-season drought, but the rematch in Dillon Gym turned into a five-set thriller. First-team All-EIVA standout George Huhmann led Princeton with 17 kills in the win, but EIVA Player of the Year Brian Negron recorded 51 assists and guided a Mason offense that hit .372 in the victory.

George Mason leads the all-time series 47-24, but Princeton swept the season series in 2017, including a 3-1 road win that featured a 15-kill performance from then-freshman outside Parker Dixon. Both Dixon and classmate Greg Luck have turned on the offense over the second half of the season; over the last 14 matches, they gave combined to average more than 5.2 kills and 3.3 digs per set, and both have produced significant efforts over playoff competition.

Still, the Tigers will depend on their All-EIVA duo of both Huhmann and Junior Oboh to lead the way against George Mason. Huhmann is the EIVA leader in both kills and points per set, and he ranks seventh in the NCAA in the latter category. Oboh is in his fourth postseason as a starting middle, and after leading the EIVA in blocks this season, both his defensive and veteran presence will be critical for a team starting four underclassmen.

George Mason is expecting a big crowd — the RAC drew more than 1500 two weeks ago against Penn State — and it handled a tough Harvard charge last weekend to clinch the top seed and right to host the postseason. The Patriots have been consistently strong all season, more so than any other team in the East. Princeton may not have always reached its ceiling this season, but when it did, the Tigers were right there with anybody. They fought for the right to see if their highest level could get them back to the NCAAs for the first time in 20 years.

On Thursday night, that journey begins.

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