The other teams in the tournament were clearly thrown off balance by the varied serving styles employed by the men's volleyball squad. From Ed Josefoski's jump serve to Ramon Hernandez's floating-drop serve, the Lions were able to keep their opponents disoriented throughout all their matches in the Mizuno Nittany Lion Invitational.

"Good serves put a lot of pressure on them," Lions' middle blocker Kevin Hourican said. "We took away their groove."

The ability to keep their opponents confused, causing several key hitting and passing mistakes, led to a relatively easy romp through the competition for the Lions. The multi-faceted serving game was the difference between the Lions and the other teams competing.

Hourican, already towering at 6-foot-7, maximized his height advantage even more with a running-jump serve. Throwing the ball 15 feet up and leaping to meet it in mid-air, the middle blocker smashed the ball over the net.

Carlos Ortiz, whose usual serve is a simple floater, utilized a different type of serve this weekend. In what appeared to be a normal serve from the line, he then exploded into a standing-jump serve. The other teams, who had let down their guard, didn't receive the ball very well and bad passes were the result.

"I use it to try to surprise them," Ortiz said. "I tried it against Stanford a couple of times and it worked. I don't want to use it too much."

The blistering southpaw serve of Ed Josefoski led to two aces and several key rallies. His serve forces opponents to change their game plan and passes. His serving strategy lately has been fairly simple.

"I just tried to put it over the net," Josefoski said. "I've been struggling up front, so I tried to pick it up somewhere else and it worked."

Middle blocker Ivan Contreras also contributed to the victory with his top-spin oriented jump serve.

"With the combination of my and the others serving, they had a little bit of trouble with their passing," Contreras said.

He added that although the team still made too many mistakes, he has high hopes for the rest of the season.