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A tournament-finale sweep was not enough for Spain and NJIT outside attacker Alvaro Gimeno to earn a berth to the 2021 EuroVolley tournament.
Gimeno coming off the bench had two kills as Spain swept the Republic of Moldova 25-23, 25-22, 25-23 on Sunday in Cyprus to move into a first-place tie with Latvia but lost the tiebreaker to miss out on the only EuroVolley bid at the qualification tournament.
With Spain and Latvia both having identical 4-2 records and 12 points, Latvia won the third tiebreaker category of set winning percentage to finish in first place. Latvia had a .700 percent set winning percentage during the tournament, while Spain ended with a .591 set winning percentage.
Spain defeated Latvia in both its meetings at the tournament, but head-to-head results was the fifth tiebreaker category.
Gimeno, the Co-EIVA Player of the Year, came off the bench as a serving specialist for Spain in all six tournament matches. In addition, Gimeno had a combined 15 kills in the limited playing time.
Latvia secured the tournament championship and bid to the EuroVolley following a sweep against the host nation Cyprus on Sunday.
Ohio State freshman outside attacker Sotiris Siapanis in the loss led all players with 13 kills and added a block.
This was the third consecutive match and fourth match of the tournament that Siapanis had double-digit kills. Siapanis also finished the tournament fourth among all players with 73 kills and was seventh with a .280 attack percentage.