VANCOUVER - The No. 5 UBC Thunderbirds (4-2) won their fourth straight by defeating Thompson Rivers WolfPack (2-4) in four sets (25-20, 22-25, 25-18 and 25-22) on Sunday afternoon in Vancouver.
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Consecutive victories on consecutive nights leave the Thunderbirds tied for second place in the conference and the team feeling pretty pleased with themselves after two tough matches. The WolfPack made UBC work for the win, pushing them hard in all four sets.
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The 'Birds rushed out to a 8-2 lead early in the first set, benefitting from a number of attack errors by Thompson Rivers. The WolfPack clawed back to almost tie it at 19-17 but UBC held out and closed the opening period.
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Much of the TRU offence was run through Brad Gunter, whose 11 kills in the second gave the WolfPack a 25-20 advantage. They led early only for UBC to pull it back to 20-20 but the Thunderbirds failed to kill it off and it was tied one set each.
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UBC started slowly again in the third dropping to a 7-4 deficit before splitting the first 20 points evenly. Four kills in a row gave the Thunderbirds some breathing space at 15-11, as
Gabriel Aaron,
Ben Chow and
Quentin Schmidt all picked up points. The 'Birds held tight to close it at 25-18 and look to kill it off in four.
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Dropping the first three points in the fourth was not what UBC head coach
Richard Schick would have planned for but they quickly rallied and had themselves an 8-5 lead and did not look back from there. They closed out the win 25-22,
Ben Chow smashing the final spike home. He ended the match with 20 kills, Aaron had 15 and
Alex Russell picked up 10.
Ian Perry has spent the last couple of games out of his usual libero position and played setter, but appeared to feel no less at ease as he finished with an impressive 49 assists.
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"TRU played a lot better today and we met the challenge" said UBC head coach Schick. "I'm really happy with the way we responded in the third set after losing a tight second after being down for most of it by five or six. We battled back and then let it slip away after 20. Really impressed with the way we responded in that third set and after 15 points. It was also great to see our guys continue to push in the fourth."
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