BLUEFIELD, Va. — After three games in California and another three games in Chicago, a trip to Bluefield wasn't reason for complaint for the University of Charleston men's volleyball team.

Charleston (2-6) made it a pleasant ride back up I-77, defeating Bluefield College 25-19, 25-12, 25-16 on Tuesday night at the Dome Gymnasium.

Consider that Charleston has already played several Division I programs, including Cal State-Northridge, San Diego, George Mason, Loyola and still have games left with Princeton, Penn State and Harvard remaining on the schedule.

No wonder a visit to Bluefield may have been seen as a "break" for the Golden Eagles, who defeated the Rams twice last season in what was the first season with a program for both schools.

"It gives us a chance to see everybody that we don't typically get to see on the court and see where they need to improve, and it's nice," Charleston coach Michael Crane said. "Bluefield has got a pretty good program, they are going to be all right.

"It is just going to take a little while to get on the same page with the new coach and all."

Despite the loss, Bluefield (0-3) first year coach Buddy Gallemore was pleased with some of what he saw from the Rams, who are 0-3 on the young season.

"The effort was there for the most part," said Gallemore, whose Rams lost matches at Eastern Mennonite two weekends ago against Alderson Broaddus and the homestanding Royals. "We didn't let as many balls drop and hit the floor. We started getting our serves in, we blocked halfway decent, we got some good touches on the ball, but the best thing we did all night was serve-receive.

"When we were playing at EMU we didn't serve-receive at all, we didn't have good ball control at all. Tonight we passed very well, we passed good enough to win, we just didn't set and hit the ball good enough to win."

Charleston did. Crane has a 20-man roster full of experience, including players from 11 states, along with Poland, Canada and the Bahamas. All have played volleyball, either at the college or club level, and it showed.

"You spend your energy recruiting and get out on the road everytime you are not playing you do what you can to get talented players in," said Crane, whose Eagles got solid serves from Anthony Rivera and Ryan Cranston, and dominating net play from Bahamians Eugene Stuart and Rajahl Moxey, along with Bryon Hurd, Ryan Santos and Brandon Greenway. "I have been there two years now so the guys are used to the system which is nice...

"Volleyball players just want a place to play. There are hundreds of thousands of volleyball players out there and tens of thousands of them go without playing it in college just because they don't have a place to go."

Bluefield, which has a roster of 16, including 10 from Virginia and one each from Honduras and Australia, does have some athletes who also played football and soccer for the Rams.

No so for Crane.

"They are all volleyball players, we don't need to convert athletes luckily," said Crane, who has no seniors and just three juniors on his team. "We would if we had some talented athletes that wanted to play, we would try to work with them, but right now they are all recruited volleyball players."

Bluefield stayed with Charleston through the first set, closing a 6-2 gap down to 18-16 before Crane took a timeout to settle down his team, which had last played on Saturday against D-I program Loyola in Chicago.

"It was a change of pace from Loyola where they had to be focused the whole time," said Crane, whose Eagles were 4-23 last season. "My guys took a couple of mental breaks and gave up a bunch of points that they should not have so it was important to try to get them to refocus."

Gallemore found the same issue with his Rams, who are still learning to not only play together, but also focus on each and every point.

"It is just the mentality, we have all just got to get on the same page here early in the season and I think if we do that we can play with teams like that and really compete," said Gallemore, whose Rams were led at the net by Chase Craycraft, Connor Holland, Daniel Griffin and David Gianesin, with Chris Dixon and Johnathan Amaral also providing points for Bluefield. "We have just got to get together and just be thinking the same thing. We have got to be on the same track."

It was all Charleston in the second set, with the Golden Eagles taking an 9-1 lead, with the margin growing to as much as the final 13. Bluefield led just twice in the match, both in the third and final set on kill by Amaral for the 1-0 lead and a serve into the net by the Eagles to a 2-1 advantage. The Eagles pulled away in the final set with its reserves on the court.

"They are all clicking, they are on the same page, they played together," Gallemore said. "I am sure they played last fall so they are on the same page."

Crane has seen signs of improvement from Bluefield's inaugural 3-20 program from last season.

"They are more athletic this year, they will be OK, their problems came in serve-receive and that just takes time to get on the same page," Crane said.  "They have been practicing only a couple of weeks, I think a couple of more weeks and they will be better off when it comes to serve-receive for sure."

Charleston returns to the court next Friday and Saturday against Princeton — yes, that Princeton, who are part of the Eastern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association — which will also bring such D-I programs as Penn State, Harvard and St. Francis (Pa.) to Charleston. George Mason has already made the visit to the Capital city.

"You don't get better if you are playing teams that are worst than you," Crane said. "Everybody wants to improve so playing the teams that are better than you is a good step for your program."

Bluefield will visit Bryan on Friday.

"We are going to watch this film, we are going to study it and kind of figure out what we need to do," Gallemore said. "We will be back at it on Friday."