VANCOUVER – The UBC Thunderbirds saw a 2-0 lead slip away in their Canada West semifinal match against Trinity Western on Friday, losing 3-2 to the Spartans (23-25, 18-25, 25-19, 26-24, 17-15) at the conference Final Four in Alberta.
BOX SCORE
"It was one of the most amazing matches I've been a part of in regards to the overall fight and composure of our group," said UBC head coach
Richard Schick. "It was really good to see. I could not be more proud and I know that a lot of people that were in attendance would say the same."
The loss puts UBC up against top-ranked and Final Four host Alberta, who were upset by Brandon in their semifinal match, in a must-win bronze medal game on Saturday. The winner of that game also gets the conference's third and final CIS tournament berth.
The T-Birds appeared to be on their way to the gold medal match with a 17-12 lead in the fourth set, already up 2-1 in the game. But UBC hit a rough patch offensively at that point, committing several attack errors to let the Spartans back in the set. Then the Trinity Western blockers got hot led by Dan Jansen Van Doorn, who was in on four blocks over the Spartans' last six points of the set, including one on set point to even the match at two.
UBC had a match point at 24-23 in the fourth set but a
Jarrid Ireland attack was blocked for a point.
"We were extremely unlucky, sometimes you've got to make your own luck. Extremely unlucky where the match was over but the ball was blocked into our guy who was out of bounds," said Schick.
The fifth set saw the teams trade side-outs most of the way, with the Spartans pulling ahead by two points late before UBC evened the score at 14. It was tied again at 15 after a
Chris Howe kill, but Steven Marshall's 11th kill of the match put Trinity up one, and another Spartans block ended the match, this time from Jarrod Offerins and Lucas Van Berkel.
UBC actually outblocked Trinity Western 15-13 in the match, but the Spartans seemed to come up with blocks in the most important moments late in sets. Jansen Van Doorn tied for a match-high with 11 blocks, also adding seven kills to help the comeback effort. Nicholas Del Bianco led all players with 22 kills on .375 hitting for Trinity Western.
Ireland led the 'Birds with 21 kills and 14 digs, hitting a solid .302 in the match. But while his wingmen on the outside,
Ben Chow and
David Zeyha, did combine for another 22 kills, they struggled with their efficiency, unable to consistently get through the Spartan blockers.
Setter
Milan Nikic, UBC's lone all-star this season, had 51 assists, 10 digs and seven blocks. Howe also had a big day at the net, with 11 blocks in the loss.
"We have to forget about it and our main focus is to play well tomorrow for bronze," said Schick. In the bronze medal game, the T-Birds will play Final Four host Alberta at 5 p.m. Pacific. The final spot in the CIS tournament is also on the line.
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