The Downside of Emotion

There are two types of great teams in the world – the emotional and the steady. Saturday’s NCAA Finals pitted the two against each other – UCI’s even-keeled fundamentals vs. USC’s unbridled enthusiasm. Which team has the edge?

I’ve played on both types of teams and I had a lot more fun playing on the emotional teams. There is something so exhilarating about getting fired up. You’re in the zone and your whole team is there with you. You’re riding high and everything feels effortless. You feel instead of think and somehow you’re finding seams, perfectly placing the ball in their open court, passing nails, digging lips and roofing their hitters. There is no over-analyzing or backtracking. You are in the present on every point and you go with the flow of the game.

Volleyball is a game of momentum. If an emotional team can get a lock on that momentum, it could be over for their opponent. Case in point, USC’s win over the Anteaters in the MPSF tourney semis. The Trojans had 12 aces and never let UCI get started, winning in three straight on the Anteaters home floor.

But there is a downside to emotion. As great as playing on an emotional team can be when things are going well, it can be equally horrible when everything falls apart. Momentum is fickle and when you lose it, it can be disastrous. Suddenly balls aren’t falling like they were, you’ve got to work for every point, nothing comes easily and the team falls into a funk. An emotional team may not be able to get their groove back in time to recover and win the match.

Truth be told, if I had to choose between the two, I’d give the edge to the steady. Because no matter what the emotional team throws at them, they know in the back of their minds that emotion is fleeting. If they can just hold steady during the surge, they’re likely to ride out the wave and get a chance to take over on the other side.

Case in point, Saturday’s final match. USC came out strong, winning the first and third games. But this time UCI stayed in it, winning game two handily and killing the Trojans in game four. UCI had a slow start hitting .219 in the first game, but steadied out hitting at or around .400 the last three games of the match.

USC was all over the map. They went from hitting .583 in the third game to hitting -.034 in the fourth. Freshman Tony Ciarelli, one of USC’s best hitters, had a rough match in which he let his emotions get the better of him. He let the UCI crowd get into his head and the announcers made several references to Ciarelli interacting with them to his detriment. After a phenomenal post-season in which he performed brilliantly, he hit only .098 for the final match.

Had USC been able to get Ciarelli’s hitting going, we might have seen a different outcome. But that is the risk you take on an emotional team. In a long match like this one, it is better to be riding the train than riding the roller coaster.

Congratulations to UCI for an incredible season and a well-deserved second national title in three years. But what a run by USC! As young as they are, we should get used to seeing a lot of them in the playoffs in years to come.