VANCOUVER – The UBC Thunderbirds men's volleyball team kicked off its pre-season on Friday night, winning a four-set match against the Mount Royal Cougars at War Memorial Gym. UBC won the opening set handily before the following three sets went the distance. Score lines for the match were 25-14, 24-26, 26-24, and 27-25 in favour of the Thunderbirds.
The Cougars had a set point opportunity in the fourth to keep the match alive, but UBC battled back from a 24-23 deficit with Jean-Benoit Gagne (Quebec City) sealing the match with a bomb of a serve in his Thunderbirds debut to give UBC the victory on Friday evening.
"In the first set we could do no wrong but Mount Royal really cleaned up their game for the remainder," said UBC head coach
Richard Schick. "Our set finishes could certainly be improved as we gave up a few two, or three-point leads in the latter stages making it closer than it needed to be."
Mac McNicol (Calgary) had a game-high 12 kills for the Thunderbirds, the only player in double digits, with UBC newcomer and Norwegian Henrik Hole (Oslo, Norway) finishing the match with 22 assists.
Irvan Brar (Surrey, B.C.) led the charge for UBC with 10 digs, while Mount Royal's Matthew Saly led his team in that department with nine digs of his own. Andrew McWilliam had a team-high nine kills for the Cougars.
The host Thunderbirds dominated the first set, as UBC jumped out to a 10-2 lead and doubled MRU in points at 12-6 and again at 16-8 midway through the opening set. UBC continued to apply the pressure following a Mount Royal timeout and upped its lead to 23-10 in the latter stages before the Cougars responded with four unanswered points.
One of the Thunderbirds' newest recruits, Hole, came on for set point and served an ace past a defenceless Mount Royal squad that sealed the opening set in UBC's favour by a 25-13 score. Hole joins the team after a stellar junior career in Norway, captaining the Norwegian under-19, and under-20 squads on numerous occasions.
The second set had a different storyline as the Cougars managed its first lead of the game before UBC tied it up at 7-7. The Cougars got into the groove on the back of Jordan Parkin's serving, winning four consecutive points which cut into UBC's sizeable lead and brought the game back to a 15-15 deadlock. Parkin is coming off a stellar 2014-2015 season where the fifth-year led the Cougars in kills and points and was the recipient of the CIS Dale Iwanoczko Award.
Momentum would be cyclical for the remainder of the second, as UBC had the opportunity to serve for the set at 24-23 but the Cougars responded with three unanswered points to win the set 26-24 and tie the game at 1-1.
In the third, UBC and MRU split the first two-dozen points, followed by a 15-15 deadlock, as the tight game carried over from the second set. Later in the third, and after several unforced errors on the part of the Cougars, the Thunderbirds extended its lead to 21-19. UBC had the good fortune of a 24-21 lead and a set point, but Parkin kept the set alive with back-to-back kills. UBC's McNicol responded with a kill of his own to put the team up 25-24 and an unforced error by Parkin allowed UBC to take a 2-1 lead in the match, and a 26-24 third set.
In the fourth, UBC jumped out to a 4-0 advantage to begin the set and held leads of 8-4, 13-11, and 17-15 highlighted by Cameron Fennema's (Victoria, B.C.) huge kill midway through the fourth. Fennema joins UBC after winning the 2015 CCAA national tournament MVP with Camosun College en route to the national championship. But again, the Cougars continued the trend of chipping into the UBC lead keeping it close until the final play of the game. Ultimately, the Thunderbirds would wrap up the game thanks to Gagne's kill, his second of two kills on the night.
Up next, the UBC Thunderbirds will traverse the country and head to the Maritimes for a four-game tour, including two games each against New Brunswick and defending AUS champions Dalhousie. The tour begins Wednesday, September 30 in Fredericton, N.B. with the remaining three games being played on consecutive nights ending Saturday, October 3 in Halifax, N.S..
"It gives us a great opportunity to play our entire team and allows our team to practice certain situations that can only be experienced in game action," added Schick regarding the team's soon-to-be trip to Eastern Canada.
The 2015 Canada West regular season begins on October 23 when UBC hosts the Manitoba Bisons with the season culminating in Hamilton, Ont., where the CIS Men's Volleyball Championships will be held in March.
