Tulane volleyball lost both games in the Tulane Invitational on Sept. 17 hosted at the Avron B. Fogelman Arena in the Devlin Fieldhouse on Tulane’s Uptown campus. The Oregon State Beavers and LSU Tigers both beat the Green Wave in convincing fashion.

Tulane opened the tournament with a 3-1 loss against Oregon State. The Green Wave had the perfect start — with a service ace and winning a tight first set 25-21. However, the Beavers regrouped and won the next two sets 25-17. Tulane trailed the fourth set but was able to level the score at 25, but two consecutive Beaver points delivered the match for the visitors.

Later that night, LSU swept Tulane 3-0. All three sets had a similar theme — LSU gained an early lead before a Tulane run forced a Tigers timeout. The visitors then would go on to clinch the set and the win. The Tigers led Tulane in every statistical category with the exception of service aces.

A worrying trend has appeared through the first month of the season: errors. Tulane commits a lot of them and although misfires will always happen, the frequency of these is cause for concern for first-year head coach Jordana Price. In the final set against Oregon State which ended 27-25 for the Beavers, Tulane committed eight errors. The Green Wave committed 18 errors total against LSU including eight in the first set.

Another area of concern is service errors. The Green Wave committed 15 service errors against Oregon State and seven against LSU. While the seven against LSU are not bad, the 15 against the Beavers are not good.

Tulane will not have a lot of time to clean up these issues, as the Green Wave start conference play at home when they host the Houston Cougars on Sept. 21 and the Cincinnati Bearcats on Sept. 23.