This weekend the Harvard men’s volleyball team may have hit the midpoint of its conference season, but a laundry list of questions remains unanswered.

Foremost among the questions: Coming off a weekend of domination against George Mason, did the Crimson have enough momentum make a push for the EIVA title?

At least for another seven days, that doubt remains. By splitting a weekend slate against Princeton (2-8, 2-3 EIVA) and NJIT (2-10, 2-2), Harvard (7-6, 4-2) maintained a hold on second place but failed to gain ground on league-leading Penn State.

“The top is in sight for us,” captain Branden Clemens said. “We definitely do have work to do. We need to alter our work ethic and our mentality…to be more intense, I think. That’ll help us reach the top.”

NJIT 3, HARVARD 2

This Saturday afternoon in Newark, N.J., the Crimson led and led until it didn’t.

Up two sets to one in the game score, Harvard allowed the Highlanders to force a fifth set; up 3-0 in that tiebreaker, the Crimson watched as NJIT mounted a comeback.

Ultimately the contest ended when the Highlanders strung together a 9-2 run, earning the set win, 15-9, and handing Harvard a five-set defeat.

Clemens led his side in kills (19), digs (11), and blocks (7). Junior outside hitter Casey White and sophomore outside hitter Brad Gretsch also posted double-digit finish totals, with 12 and 11, respectively.

“Saturday was the first game where I felt like we weren’t as super high-energy as normal,” Clemens said. “It definitely wasn’t our most crisp weekend.”

Harvard took early control in the afternoon, winning two of the first three games. The third frame was the most dominant: after claiming two of the first three points, the Crimson never trailed, finishing with a 25-19 victory.

But NJIT battled back to win the fourth and fifth sets—both after closing an early gap. Down 2-1, for example, the Highlanders faced an 11-7 deficit before mounting a comeback. With the score tied at 18-18, NJIT won four consecutive points and pushed ahead for the 25-20 set.

On an afternoon when neither team hit above .240, both sides showed signs of sloppy play throughout the match. Notably, in the first frame, the Highlanders racked up more errors than kills in a 25-22 game defeat.

In fact, the only game in which both teams hit above .200 was the second, when NJIT used a pair of mid-set 4-0 stretches to take control in a 25-22 win.

“We’re at the midpoint of the season, roughly,” senior outside hitter Alec Schlossman said. “We’re playing well, but we want to be playing our best volleyball in April when we go to conference playoffs.”