Some hosts invite a few lesser opponents and maybe one more serious challenger with the hopes of collecting a trophy from their own tournaments., Not the Hillsborough High School boys volleyball team., For the last 12 seasons, Hillsborough has been inviting the best of the best to their Raider Invitational to start the season., “Our goal is to always invite the top teams in the state every year,” said Raiders head coach Todd Sudol. “We try to get as many teams in the state Top 10 and Top 20.”, On Saturday, Hillsborough welcomed seven teams currently ranked in the Top 12 out of eight teams in the tournament. Southern, St. Peter’s Prep, Hunterdon Central, Fair Lawn, St. Joseph’s Metuchen and East Brunswick are all highly ranked. North 13th Street Tech came as an unranked but solid squad., “During the scrimmage season, I scrimmaged a lot of teams that were also ranked in the Top 10,” Sudol said. “For me as a coach, I put together a tough scrimmage schedule where you’re playing the top teams in the state, we host a tournament every year on opening weekend, and the reason I do that as a coach, it’s almost like a yardstick to measure where my varsity guys are as a program, what are the things we have to improve on?, “When you play the top teams, they’re going to expose some of your weaknesses. My job as a coach, the only way we’re going to get better, is if we work on some of the things we’re not as strong in yet. I like doing that because I think that only benefits us in the long run.”, Hunterdon Central ended up winning the Raider Invitational, but Hillsborough gained plenty of encouragement from its strong showing. They split sets with the current No. 1 Southern, beat Fair Lawn in two sets, lost two sets to Hunterdon Central and went 2-1 against East Brunswick. Hillsborough is currently ranked fifth in the state., “All the coaches when they first got here Saturday morning said, no one is going to go undefeated with the teams here,” Sudol recalled. “You know you’re going to have some games you’re going to win, you know you’re going to have some you lose, but you can’t ever be afraid to go out and challenge yourself. That’s what I did to my guys. I definitely challenged my guys and I think they’re only going to be stronger for it. I think it’s going to help us start the season off this week. You want to build your players’ confidence, but at the same time you want to get better.”, Hillsborough opened the regular season with a 25-10, 25-12 blanking of Hopewell Valley on Tuesday. Logan Conway had 20 assists. Vivek Mantha had nine kills and three digs. Eric Ross had five kills and two blocks. Jake Powell had four kills and two digs. Connor Sweeny had eight digs. Dan Duffek, Matt Hendrix, Mike Jeney, and Rupak Stephen all had at least one kill. Marcus Urrutia had four digs. Kevin Cole had two assists and TD Le had a block., As it headed into Wednesday’s scheduled quad meet at St. Joseph’s that will feature tougher competition again, this year’s group was eyeing maintaining the program standards. Hillsborough has been ranked in the Top 15 in the state the last 11 years straight., “We’re a team that’s ranked in the Top 20 every year and we want to play those teams so that we remain there,” Sudol said. “The guys want it. The guys like playing high level competition. I think that’s the only way you get better. You have to push yourself mentally, you have to push yourself physically and we have a high standard in this volleyball program and we want to make sure we’re at the top or near the top and are contenders every year. It’s kind of what you have to go through. You have to challenge yourself.”, Hillsborough opens the year as a highly regarded team thanks to the return of a core of experience that is mixing in with players now in bigger roles with the varsity. Ross, Sweeny, Powell and Hendrix are four seniors that have good experience., “The four of those guys played a good amount of varsity time last year and Connor and Jake even got some varsity time as sophomores,” Sudol said. “So I have a nice strong senior class that’s going to give me what I always look for in all the teams I coach – that senior leadership. I think that goes a long way.”, Manthan is a talented right side hitter who leads the junior class. Sudol sees good improvements in his all-around game that will make him a bigger threat. Conway is a junior and is stepping into the key starting role as setter., “He really put a lot of time in during the offseason playing club volleyball,” Sudol said. “Even though he’s a junior, he’s already shown a lot of promise that he can lead the team this year and get the ball in the hands of our hitters. I’ve been real impressed with that. He played JV last year and he got varsity time last year so he had some time to set. He was challenged as a sophomore., “I think the setter is a big role on a volleyball team, and his asset other than his athletic abilities and talent at setting is he really holds his composure well on the court. He doesn’t get frustrated. He’s looking to rebound and get the next play. He’s a calm, cool, collected leader you need so guys don’t get frustrated and we can run our system, we can control the tempo of the game. He’s doing a nice job of that and that’s not easy to do.”, Sudol has liked how the group is shaping up in the early going. The Raiders have looked strong, particularly on defense., “I’ve really liked the way we’ve played defense on the net, blocking other teams’ best hitters,” Sudol said. “We’re doing a solid job of winning what I call the net game. That is taking another team’s best hitter out of a game by blocking him. We’re blocking, we’re getting a lot of touches, we’re slowing down other team’s hitters.”’, Good defense will give Hillsborough more chances to run its offense. The Raiders will get tougher as they fine-tune the little weaknesses that Sudol has seen., “We have to tighten up our passing, we have to play hard-nosed defense, we have to be able to run down balls, dive for balls,” he said. “I’d like to see us keep working on that. We’re trying to run a fast-tempo offense and that’s not easy. I want us to continue to work on that so we’re quick when we play our opponents.”, Nothing has given Hillsborough better practice than its Raider Invitational and some tough pre-season games to challenge them. Hillsborough has been in tough spots early so they can adjust and be good when faced with them late in the season and postseason., “Even in practice, is I want to put my guys in pressure cooker situations where they have to think fast and react quick, they’re under stress to score a point,” Sudol said. “With a really tough scrimmage schedule and having the top teams in the state at our tournament, that put us through some really early season tests. Can we handle being down a few points and battling back, or can we be up against a good team and take them out like we did against Southern in one of the two sets? That is invaluable experience and I like how we came out of those situations. I always think we can do better and get better and that’s my job, to make sure these guys are focused and keep getting improvements.”
