TORONTO (U SPORTS) – First Team All-Canadian
Danielle Brisebois tallied a game-high 23.5 points, and the UBC Thunderbirds clinched a berth in the national semifinals at the U SPORTS Women's Volleyball Championship, Presented by Jason Rinaldi, by topping the Western Mustangs 3-1 (25-20, 23-25, 25-19, 25-20) in their quarter-final contest on Friday afternoon at the Mattamy Athletic Centre.
Brisebois tallied 22 kills to go along with an ace and eight digs, while
Juliana Kaufmanis added 12 kills, three aces, and 13 digs for the Thunderbirds, who advance to take on a familiar foe in fellow Canada West representative Trinity Western on Saturday night.
"I think there were a lot of jitters on the court especially in the first set," said Brisebois. "It definitely wasn't perfect, but I'm glad we were able to battle with them and come out on top. I think now we all just need to take a deep breath. We're in the final four, so let's see what we can do now."
The Thunderbirds worked at a .333 efficiency throughout the afternoon, but struggled at times from the service line, committing 21 serve errors compared to 12 aces.
"(It was) not our 'A' game but that's not unusual in the first round of nationals," said UBC coach
Doug Reimer. "So having said that, I give our team some credit…I think the response was there. I thought we handled the ball better (in the third set). Given how poorly we served, I thought our side-out offense was pretty good.
"We are going to have to serve the ball significantly better. We have to work harder and execute better defensively. If we are able to play with some joy and some purpose, and get into it, we will give Trinity a good run tomorrow."
"We got our jitters out," said UBC Player of the Game
Samantha Patko (Vancouver, B.C.), who picked up 12 digs and five assists. "Coming into nationals there are always some nerves so I thought we got that out. We missed a few too many serves but recovered well."
Playing in their first national championship since 2011, the Mustangs looked a bit nervous out of the gate, and the 10-time banner winners from UBC took full advantage, jumping out to 13-1 lead in the opening set. As they showed on numerous occasions one weekend earlier at the OUA Championship, the Mustangs persevered to pick up 13 of the next 17 points to pull within five points of the Thunderbirds.
Gyimah tallied back-to-back aces to help maintain the Western momentum, but UBC held off the rally thanks to four kills from Brisebois and three aces by
Ciara Hanly to take the first set 25-20.
The Mustangs would carry that momentum into the second set, however, and after the teams traded the first ten points of the set, the OUA silver medalists grabbed a 16-13 advantage at the technical timeout.
After the Thunderbirds evened the set at 17-17, Western took the next four points, which was capped off with a timely ace from Veltman A tip from Candice Scott would give the Mustangs three set points, and a thunderous kill from the middle of the net by Veltman, her fourth of the set, evened the match 1-1 heading into the third.
Maggie Li picked up back-to-back kills to give the Thunderbirds a 6-5 led early in the third set. After Western tied the game, Brisebois would make her presence felt, picking up three straight kills from the left side to put UBC up by four. Setter
Alessandra Gentile used some trickery to pick up two more points, twice dumping the ball into the open court to help the Thunderbirds maintain their spread. UBC held a 16-14 lead at the technical.
The Thunderbirds picked up four of the next five points coming out of the break to give themselves some breathing room. A block by Kaufmanis was followed by an ace from Miric to put UBC up 20-15. A Western service error gave the Thunderbirds set point, and Brisebois put her team up 2-1 with her seventh kill of the set.
After taking a 10-6 lead in the fourth, the UBC serving hit a cold spell, as three different Thunderbird servers put the ball into the net, allowing the Mustangs to climb back to within four points of the lead. After an ace by Li put UBC up 21-15, the Mustangs grabbed the next three points to tighten the set. Coming out of their own timeout, the Thunderbirds responded with a mini-run by taking three of the next four points, and the game ended with a Mustang attack going off the net antenna.
"It's been such a great five years," said the senior Brsiebois when asked about the final games of her T-Bird career. "I just hope we end on a nice high note. That would be the perfect fairy tale ending."
UBC will take on Trinity Western at 3:00 p.m. (PDT) on Saturday in the first semifinal of the Championship.
