WINNIPEG – The reigning U SPORTS national champion UBC Thunderbirds opened the 2019-20 Canada West women's volleyball season with a four-set win over the Winnipeg Wesmen Saturday at the Duckworth Centre.
 
UBC got 12 kills apiece from Gabrielle Attieh and Anna Price, who also added 11 digs, and the returning national title-holders scraped out a 3-1 (25-16. 17-25, 25-23, 25-22) Canada West conference women's volleyball victory.

The Thunderbirds were held to .158 attacking on the night but found enough of an offence to come away with a win in their opening-night debut.

Ashleigh Laube had 14 kills and Emma Parker 12 for the Wesmen, who hit .191 for the match. Laube added 15 digs. 
 

The T-Birds are starting a veteran lineup but it is also a roster that has had turnover in terms of starters from a year ago.

"We got some strong play tonight and competed well as a group, we did a lot of good things," UBC head coach Doug Reimer said. "We've got some experienced players but there's a grand total of zero starters from last year's national championship team. We're going to need to find a way to get it done by committee offensively because we lost a fair bit of our offence. So that was what I was happy about. Individually, I thought we played with good discipline and a good balance of insuring that we were playing free and going for it without too many errors."

Laura Worsley had a match-high 17 digs for UBC. Winnipeg libero Madison Fyvie added 16. Second-year setter Kayla Oxland had a team-high 36 assists.
 
The teams will close out the weekend series Sunday at 12 noon PT.