USA edge Puerto Rico in five-set thriller

GUADALAJARA, Mexico, October 24, 2011 – United States edged Puerto Rico in a five-set thriller (22-25, 25-19, 20-25, 25-16, 15-13) in the first match of men’s volleyball tournament at the XVI Pan American Games on Monday.

The Americans recovered from a 12-9 deficit in the tie-breaker behind the serves of Captain Evan Patak to prevail in the Pool B match.

Patak led the winners with 27 points including seven blocks and two aces while Tony Ciarelli registered three blocks and two service winners among his 24 points. Puerto Rico’s Roberto Muñiz totaled 18 points including six blocks while Ezequiel Cruz and Victor Rivera contributed 14 and 13 respectively.

The United States had a slight margin of 15-14 in the blocking category and held a 4-2 edge in aces. Both teams gave away 32 points with unforced errors.

Evan Patak (Captain of USA): “Before coming in to this match we didn’t have much time to train as a team. We played well. We made some mistakes, but we played as a team. After seeing the stats, this is an effort by a lot of players who contributed to the win and that is important to be successful in this tournament.”

Héctor Soto (Captain of Puerto Rico): “I think we started the match as we wanted, but without taking off the merit to USA, we gave them up this match. We almost had the win. We had the chance, but in the end they made fewer mistakes than us.”

John Speraw (Coach of USA): “I am obviously very happy with the results. Our expectations coming to this tournament were a little unknown, simply because these players had never played an international match before. They were excited after playing the national jersey for the first time and they had a lot of energy.”

Carlos Cardona (Coach of Puerto Rico): “We could not manage the pressure of this match. The USA jersey has a special weight when you play against an American team. We thought that playing against the USA Alternate team was a must win situation for us and that was a lot of pressure. We could not find a fluid game. We made a lot of mistakes, without consistency on the attack and that really affected us.”