I caught the mens volleyball team game last night. BYU is (or was) ranked as the #2 team in the nation, had an 8 match winning streak or something and last night, jumped out to a 2-0 set lead over CONCORDIA IRVINE, a school which I didn’t even know existed until last night. Not only that, they dominated the first 2 sets, 25-16 and 25-19, which are dominating scores, if you know volleyball.
So in set 3 they have a mental breakdown and lose by a closer score of 22-25. No huge deal for a #2 team that has their mental stuff together, right? But then they can’t get it back on track and lose set 4, 21-25 and during that set it became obvious that it was nothing more than a head case thing. They were clearly the more talented team… except in the mental aspect of the game.
They go on to lose the final set 14-16 and there you go… head case city, aka Provo, rears its’ ugly head and BYU chokes away an easy match against the #14 ranked Concordia Irvine Eagles. I don’t think there has been an eagle sighting in Irvine in probably 100 years… and in fact only a month ago BYU beat this same team in 3 sets 25-21, 25-22 and 25-15.
So what is the problem with the BYU sports teams? This has been an issue since I can remember. It ultimately keeps the teams from being winners.