The No. 7 CSUN Matadors (13-3) faced their biggest challenge of the season against No. 1 Long Beach State (15-0) on Wednesday night, losing 3-0.
The loss serves as a reflective moment for a red-hot CSUN team that has won eight straight and is thriving to make some real noise in the Big West.
Despite the loss, CSUN head coach Theo Edwards said the team is using the game as an opportunity to prepare for the demanding schedule ahead.
“They’re an excellent team, and obviously based on the result, they challenged us in many ways. And honestly in ways that we need,” Edwards said. “We are entering into Big West play right now, and this is really the greatest time for us to start looking in the mirror and figuring out some things we can continue to fix and work on.”
CSUN has had some trouble this year when facing ranked competition. The team is 2-3 versus ranked opponents, with dominant wins against No. 10 Pepperdine and No. 8 Grand Canyon.
The Matadors struggled in their three losses to UCLA, USC and LBSU. Uncharacteristic mistakes in the game’s margins returned to bite CSUN in close sets.
Chris Karnezis, the Matadors’ libero, emphasized that fact after losing to LBSU.
“Honestly, we prepared really well [for Long Beach] and it just felt like it was the details. We did a lot of things well, but then a bunch of the small things didn’t go our way and I felt like that’s what hurt us,” Karnezis said.
However, this group was shown to be one of the more resilient teams at the conference. After suffering back-to-back losses to top-ranked opponents earlier in the year, they rattled off eight straight wins and went undefeated during February. The ups and downs brought the team closer as a unit.
“I have very little doubt that we’ll have trouble [bouncing back],” Edwards said. “I’ve seen us be tough. I’ve seen us go through adversity on and off the court, and these guys love each other so we’ll be fine in that department.”
Karnezis echoed his coach’s statement.
“I say to everybody that we’re probably the closest team in the NCAA. We’re gonna have no problem moving on to the next game and if anything, it’s just gonna give us more fire for practice,” Karnezis said.
Luckily for CSUN, they got another crack at the Beach on March 14 at Walter Pyramid. Going up against this squad again at their house will be a tall task, but the challenge doesn’t faze CSUN.
The main thing for the Matadors is not to focus on the mistakes they made in the first matchup but to remind themselves that they have the drive and ability to compete with the best teams in the NCAA set-to-set.
