 Sports News Search Classifieds Cougars lose close match
February 7, 2000 
Susan Kreklow once encouraged the Columbia College men’s volleyball team from the bench. Now, since taking the MU women’s volleyball head coaching job on Thursday, she could only take a nonpartisan role as the public address announcer in the Cougars’ 15-11, 16-14, 11-15, 8-15, 15-13 loss to No. 17 NCAA Quincy University at Southwell Gymnasium on Sunday.Kreklow tried her best not to show favoritism as the announcer but occasionally cheered from the scorer’s table in Xu Bing’s first home match as the Cougars head coach. The No. 2 NAIA Cougars (3-1, 3-0 Midwest Intercollegiate Volleyball Association) came within two points of pulling off a major upset, but lost to the Hawks (5-0, 2-0 Midwest Collegiate Conference) in a rally-score fifth set, where there are no sideouts and all points are counted. Quincy now leads the all-time series 5-0. “This was a game that had two very good teams and a couple of points would have made all the difference,” said Xu. “It was our first time playing an NCAA team and the first time with rally-score. But we now have the experience to play teams like this one.” For the first time all season, a Columbia College opponent had a more impressive aerial attack. Opposite Winder Montano, the Cougars’ leading scorer, had by far his worst match of the season. While he did lead the team with 31 kills, the Hawks’ blockers limited his hitting percentage to a season-low 22 percent. “Winder has been murdering other teams all season, but today he was having a bad day,” said Cougars setter Mike Taylor, who had a match-high 77 assists. One Quincy hitter not only did damage to the Cougars, but to the gym itself. Outside hitter Daniel Runha, a Brazilian native, broke the glass window of a fire extinguisher holder in the first set and then took down a Cougar volleyball banner in the second. Hawk blockers Paul Johnson (6 feet 10 inches), Stefan Sjostrom (6 feet 5 inches) and Rob Steinkuehler (6 feet 8 inches) caused problems for Columbia hitters throughout the match. Steinkuehler, a St. Louis native and the MCC’s player of the week, led Quincy with 30 kills, most of them coming from straight down the middle. “He came up big today,” said Taylor, who played against Steinkuehler several times in high school. The first two sets belonged to Quincy, which jumped on Columbia College early. The Cougars rallied by sprawling all over the court and had numerous digs during the third and fourth sets, led by outside hitters Ryan Haggerty’s match-high 17 and Ivan Toptchiysky’s 16. The Cougars will have a chance to avenge this loss by traveling to Quincy, Ill. on April 7. Columbia College returns to conference action Tuesday with a home match against No. 8 Missouri Baptist College.
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