While picking up its first win of the season was important, it wasn’t the most valuable thing the volleyball team accomplished in this weekend’s Super 8/Pepsi InvitationalTtournament at Lantz Arena. As the Panthers won one of the three games in the round-robin tourney, the members of the squad grew familiar with each other.

Eastern finished second in the tournament despite tying with Central Michigan (1-2) and Montana (1-2) in matches won. The Panthers won the tiebreaker by going 6-7 in games played. CMU finished third and the Grizzlies took fourth. Wright State won the tournament by going 3-0 in the matches.

“We found out what we need to work on,” Panther head volleyball coach Brenda Winkeler said. “We wanted to locate our strengths and weaknesses.”

Blocking proved to be the Panthers most glaring weakness in the squad’s second match, a five-game loss to Central Michigan. Eastern out-attacked (79-69 in kills) and out-dug (91-78) the Chippewas, but blocking ultimately made the difference in the 30-28, 28-30, 30-28, 30-25, 17-15 decision. The Panthers had only seven team blocks while CMU had 13.

In Eastern’s final match of the tournament, it came away with a 30-20, 31-29, 28-30, 30-24 win over Montana and had a better showing on defense and blocking than in its first two matches.

“During the CMU game I told the team that someone has to take charge and press over the net on a block,” said Winkeler. “The thing about this team is that they do what I tell them to do. They listen well.”

The Panthers took Winkeler’s advice to heart during the match.

On Friday night, after losing the first and second games to Wright State 30-17 and 30-21, the Panthers were told to be more aggressive on serving.

The players listened to the advice, but the over-aggressiveness turned into service errors. The new rally scoring system, which debuted this weekend, cost Eastern numerous points. The Panthers lost to the Raiders in four games.

“You’re going to see a lot of inconsistency at the beginning of the season from any team,” Winkeler said. “I think this is happening all over the country, where teams are learning how costly service errors can be.”

Senior middle hitter Leslie Przekwas, a First Team All-Ohio Valley Conference selection last season, got her season started off on the right foot. She had 37 kills over the weekend and was named to the all-tournament team. Freshman Erica Gerth was also an all-tourney team selection as she accumulated 38 kills including a double-double against Montana (14 kills and 14 digs).

“We thought when we recruited Erica with her jumping ability she’d come in and get some playing experience right away,” said Winkeler. “She really had a great tournament this weekend.”

Carrie Stevens, Marcia Hahn and Karen Liss also had strong showings in the season’s opening weekend. Hahn had 30 kills and 20 digs.

“Marcia really stepped up,” said Winkeler. “She played the best I’ve seen her play in about a year and half. She’s really the heart and soul of this team right now on the court and off of it.”