VANCOUVER – The UBC Thunderbirds (1-0) opened their 2025-26 Canada West campaign in dominant fashion Friday night at War Memorial Gym, defeating the defending national champion Brandon Bobcats (0-1) in straight sets (25-15, 25-17, 25-12).

"I thought we did a really good job of sustaining service pressure," said UBC head coach Mike Hawkins. "We know that they're a great team. They've got a lot of guys with winning experience, but we knew that we needed to keep them off the net with really strong serving. Kudos to our guys, we had a couple going different runs throughout the match, which allowed us to be efficient in the transition game."



For the 'Birds, Reeve Gingera and Dawson Pratt led the way with 11 kills apiece, with Gingera adding three aces. Gavin Moes chipped in eight kills and seven digs, while Alex Emery tallied six kills and an ace.

On the other side of the net, Tom Friesen had seven kills and an ace, Liam Pauls earned five kills and 10 digs, with Matthew Siebenga contributing three kills and an ace.



The Thunderbirds jumped out to a 9-3 lead in the first set, fueled by kills from Pratt, Emery, and Gingera before Brandon called timeout. A five-point surge capped by a Mason Greves ace extended UBC's lead to 17-9, and the hosts cruised to a 25-15 finish.

Set two was tighter, with both teams trading points until midway through. A 4-0 UBC run pushed the hosts ahead 18-16 and forced a Bobcats timeout. The T-Birds emerged from the break with fire, stringing together six straight points before Emery closed it out with a kill for 25-17.

In the third, Moes made it 13-8 with a kill from the left side, followed by a statement Gingera spike to an open pocket centre court to increase the gap to 15-9. The Bobcats got back some points, but were not able to string enough together to close the gap. Moes added another standout point, ending a long rally in favour of the 'Birds, before a Nicholas Johnson ace sealed the match at 25-12.



"I expect Brandon to do the same thing that they've done for every single year since Grant Wilson's been the coach," added Hawkins, looking forward to tomorrow's rematch. "They're a gritty team. They definitely have a ton of fight in them.We know that this was just one game and we expect a really good Brandon team tomorrow.We need to go watch some video, find some areas that we can upgrade, but we're gonna expect, guys like Liam Pauls, Riley Brunet, and Matthew Siebenga to play really well so that's gonna be a challenge tomorrow."

The two teams meet again Saturday, October 18, at 4:00 p.m. (PT) at War Memorial Gym.