Late Monday evening, the four teams selected for the 2010 ECAC Metro NY/NJ Men’s Volleyball Tournament were announced, and the Lehman College men’s volleyball team was one of the teams picked to participate in the tournament. The Lightning, who put together a 15-11 overall record (9-5 CUNYAC), were named the No. 3 seed.
The tournament will take place on Saturday afternoon at Bard College. The No. 1 seeded Hawks of Hunter College will take on the No. 4 seeded Raptors of Bard College, while the No. 2 seed – the Gothic Knights of New Jersey City University – will battle the Lightning. Both of those contests are scheduled for noon on Saturday, with the championship scheduled for later that day at 3:00pm.
First year head coach Wolfgang Lucena did a phenomenal job this season with the Lightning. After a slow 0-2 start, Lehman College captured 15 of its final 24 matches, and never lost consecutive matches again after dropping the season’s first two contests. Lehman College earned the No. 3 seed in the 2010 CUNYAC Tournament, defeating the sixth seeded Yellow Jackets of New York City College of Technology by a score of 3-0 at the APEX Center back on March 23rd. Three days later, the Lightning’s run at a CUNYAC title when Lehman fell to Hunter. Lucena believes the Lightning will be ready to go this Saturday.
“Our guys have been anxiously awaiting the possibility of continuing our season, and once they learned that they were selected to participate in the ECAC’s, they were extremely happy,” Lucena said. “We’re very confident in our ability to make our mark in this tournament, and we’ll give it our best.”
It’ll be the third meeting this season between the Lightning and Gothic Knights. New Jersey City University won both contests – capturing a 3-0 victory back on January 21st in the regular season opener for the Lightning, and then defeating Lehman 3-1 in the Lightning’s final regular season match on March 19th. The Lightning will hope the third time against NJCU is a charm.
Keep it posted to www.lehmanathletics.com for all the developments with the Lehman College men’s volleyball team and the ECAC Tournament.