Enriques Family Faceoffs Begin Tonight with Stanford/Northridge

The Enriques family breeds strong men’s volleyball players. They come by it naturally as their mother, Julie, played at Oregon State, and their father coaches volleyball back in Hawaii. One brother, Cory, played at Hawaii, but now the focus in on four youngest brothers: Evan, Emmett, and twins Addison and Avery.

Evan is a senior libero at Stanford. Emmett is a junior libero at Cal State Northridge after spending the last two seasons at Cal Baptist, which cut its program in May. Addison is a freshman libero at Concordia (Irvine) and Avery is a freshman libero at Grand Canyon.

Originally the group were all set to play in the MPSF conference, but Northridge’s move to the Big West changed that. Still, the quartet will meet up in 10 matches in 2018, beginning tonight.

VolleyMob will have a more in depth look at the Enriques family as the season progresses, but first, we preview the first match in this unique saga.

This week’s action will feature: Evan vs. Emmett Part 5 or Stanford vs. Cal State Northridge as well as Emmett vs. Addison (Addi) Part 1 or CSUN vs. Concordia. Stay tuned later in the week for a look at the latter.

Evan vs. Emmett Part 5 — No.  CSUN at No. 16 Stanford;
9 p.m. ET; Palo Alto, California
Watch / Live Stats

Series History: This is the fifth meeting between Evan’s Stanford team and his brother Emmett. The previous four all came with Emmett representing Cal Baptist. Stanford is 4-0 against Emmett, winning via sweep twice in 2016 and in three and five sets in 2017.

Statistically Speaking: Stanford is off to a 1-4 start, falling to Saint Francis, Princeton, UC Santa Barbara and No. 1 Ohio State before earning its first win on the road at Ball State on Saturday.

Sophomore setter Paul Bischoff played for the first time in 2018 over the weekend. Jaylen Jasper leads a group of five players averaging more than two kills per set. Jasper (3.16) is followed by junior outside Jordan Ewert (2.75), sophomore outside Eric Beatty (2.50), freshman outside Leo Henken (2.11) and redshirt senior middle Kevin Rakestraw (2.11). Jasper also has served up a team-best seven aces, while Rakestraw is hitting at a .397 clip and has put up a team-leading 0.72 blocks per set. Defensively, Evan Enriques has pulled up a team-best 3.00 digs per set, including three double-digit efforts.

Northridge is 4-0 heading into Wednesday’s match, besting Saint Francis, NJIT and Princeton opening weekend and sweeping UC Merced on Friday.

The Matadors are hitting at a  .397 clip on the season, have already served up 30 aces and are averaging 3.0 blocks per set. Three players are averaging more than 3.00 kills per set, while another chips in more than 2.00 putdowns. Senior opposite Arvis Greene leads the team with 3.90 kills per set, while hitting at a .433 clip and serving up a team-best 10 aces. Redshirt junior outside Lucas Timm (3.40), junior outside Dimitar Kalchav (3.00) and sophomore outide Ksawery Tomsia (2.30) follow, each hitting at an almost .400 clip. Kalchev also has added nine aces.

At the net, redshirt freshman middle Gabe Vernoy (1.38), junior middle Eric Chance (1.23) and senior middle Josiah Byers (1.14) put up more than a block per set. Freshman Sean Mitchell boasts a team-leading 2.20 digs per set, followed by Emmett Enriques (1.70), but Enriquez has started the last three matches at libero.

EVAN’S TAKE:

I am actually excited, because since the transfer from Cal Baptist to Northridge, I think he has joined a much better team. He hasn’t beaten me yet, but I think he has a much better shot now. It is going to fun playing him, but I think it is going to be a much bigger challenge this time around than previous times.

I think mostly I am just happy that my parents get to come watch us. Maybe for my other brothers, it is “I want to take him down,” or whatnot, but for me, it is that I am more happy that it brings us together and I get to see my family more than anything, more than focusing on ‘oh, I’ve got to take down my brother.’  If I win, if I lose, it will be the same for me.

I would like to win, but it is not like I am going to run it down my brother’s throat if we beat them. They might, actually they probably will, do that if they win.

Since you know his game having played together your whole lives, have you helped your team scout him at all?

If we were attackers or setters or blockers, those tendencies that we each know would be more helpful in scouting. But, since we both kind of do our own thing on defense, it is not as pertinent to the overall game. I think we just kind of focus on our own deal. It is not like we go into scouting and say, hey my brother does this… there is not too much of that that actually needs to be done. Maybe on serve receive, but especially in our position, the general rule of thumb is try not to serve the libero because generally the libero is the best passer.

Thoughts on playing Northridge, who is 4-0, which your team got off to a rough start?

For me, generally I have no idea who we play next week. That is not me being ignorant, that is me trying to focus on what needs to be done now and what needs to be done in practice and stuff and I think that is the general mindset of the team. I had no idea that Northridge was 4-0 even though my brother plays on the team. I don’t know if that is good or bad. Honestly, I would expect nothing less because they are a really good team.

EMMETT’S TAKE:

First off, I am super excited to get to play him. We have a really big fan base, a lot of family that comes out and wants to support us. A lot of people where we are from watch online, so that is really cool. It is just super fun to play him and I get to play one of my younger brothers this weekend.

This will be the time that we beat them. This is the best team that I have been on yet, so I think if there is ever a chance that I will get to beat Evan, this will be the season.

He says he is just happy but he wants to win. All of us are competitive. If we were to win, I am not getting my hopes up, but if we win, I am definitely doing that (hanging it over his head).

Usually the biggest thing we keep track of is that we compare each other’s digs. Last year, when I played outside hitter, we lost in 3, but I had more digs than him. And then the next time we played them, we were both liberos, and we only lost by a few points in five. It was a really tough game. We were up two sets, so I thought we were going to win, but we didn’t. It was a crazy game but I didn’t get the W from him.

Have you helped your team scouting Evan?

First off, he is really good, and everyone on our team knows that. We know he is a phenomenal defensive player, so I don’t really have to say anything.

We are actually beach partners. Every summer we play together, and we have played beach together for the last five years. The last few summers we have been doing really well on the beach because I think we are very similar in how we play, but I don’t think we can do much as liberos against each other.

Your team is playing well right now and you think you have a chance to beat him this year. Why is that? 

I love this team. It is a lot different than my last year’s team. Last year I went to Cal Baptist. It was a private school, smaller school vibe. When I came here, all of our teammates click, which is awesome, the skill level here is just so amazing. I think one of the best assets of our team is that we click on and off the court, which teams rarely see.

The last two years, I have played every single game. I really hadn’t had any competition at my last school. When I came here, we had two really good liberos: Kelsey Yogi, who left, and Sean Mitchell, a freshman who is really good. He started off the season, and then I have been playing the last three games. I have a lot of competition and obviously competition makes everyone better. It is a lot different for me because I am not used to it, but it is good, especially for the team.

You said you aren’t getting your hopes up, though. Why not?

From my experience in college volleyball, rankings don’t mean anything. I know that they have one of the better starting setters and he has been out and now he is back in. I know we have been talking about that a lot.

I feel like we are the underdog even though we are ranked seventh and they are 15th or 16th. I still think we are the underdog. Even though we started the year off super strong that doesn’t mean that we don’t have to fight and improve. I think we are the underdog and I am the underdog.