Parts of their game coming together but not enough to challenge Bisons as Griffins fall 3-0

Jason Hills
For MacEwan Athletics

EDMONTON — The MacEwan Griffins are finding parts of their game come together, they just need to find the rest of the pieces to put it all together

MacEwan suffered a straight sets (25-16, 25-18, 25-11) loss to the Manitoba Bisons on Friday night at the David Atkinson gym, but there are some positive signs coming from arguably one of the youngest teams in the country.

“There were a lot of good things, and we were running smooth, but then they’d have those runs of three, four or five, where we couldn’t get out of,” said Griffins head coach Brad Poplawski.

“We still have some inconsistency… we talked between the second and third set about controlling the controllables, and I don’t know if we did a good enough job of that tonight.”

MacEwan was led by Brendon Lord and Daylan Laszlo who recorded seven kills each. Kenneth Ang led the Griffins with 14 assists.

Eric Ogaranko led Manitoba with 13 kills, as the Bisons combined to record a .433 attacking percentage.

The Bisons gave MacEwan quite a few fits at the service line recording 14 aces, including eight from Karil Dadash Adeh.

MacEwan hung with Manitoba throughout a good portion of the opening set. 

A nice kill from Spencer Loucks and an ace from Keegan Hanrahan was part of a run that helped cut Manitoba’s lead to 13-12, but a 14-4 run by the Bisons put the opening set away.

“We started the game super fired up and ready to go, and maybe we’re starting too high, and we just can’t maintain that. We have to find that same level of talk, communication and performance and sustain that in the match,” said Poplawski.

The second set was very similar to the first, as the Griffins battled back-and-forth with Manitoba for a good chunk of the set.

Spencer Loucks puts away the first kill of the match for the @MacEwanGriffins!
They’re in the thick of the battle against @umbisons at the David Atkinson Gym.#GriffNation pic.twitter.com/KBcFPFIzO2

— MacEwan Griffins Men’s Volleyball Team (@GriffinsMVB) January 24, 2026

The Griffins held an early lead, and then Manitoba re-took the lead. Lord’s back-to-back kills trimmed the Bisons lead to 15-13, but a 10-5 run by Manitoba would close it out.

“I don’t know if there is one thing we can rely on right now. Our team is still trying to form our solid identity, so when things are going wrong, we can hang our hat on that,” said Poplawski.

“We’ve had so many injuries and guys in and out of our lineup, it’s been hard to establish our identity. I think it shows when we give up those runs, we don’t know what we can rely on.”

While the Griffins put up a good fight in the first two sets, it unravelled in the third set.

Manitoba is a team that can bomb it from the service line, and it showed — especially in the third set.

Dadash Adeh recorded five of his eight aces in the third set.

He nailed an ace to give the Bisons a 10-4 lead, and he finished off a 12-0 run with back-to-back-to-back aces to give a commanding 19-4 lead.

“He has one of the biggest serves in our conference, and we will see some more of that over the next few weeks, so we have to learn how to pass those,” said Poplawski.

“We don’t have a guy that serves like that (on their team), it’s like a baseball player who’s used to seeing a fastball in the high 80s, and then all of a sudden he’s facing one at 102. It’s a difference.

“He’s probably serving the ball at 115-118 (km/hr), and it’s tough if you don’t see that all the time.”

Poplawski said he understands he has a young team, who at times are getting thrown into the fire, and are facing a steep learning curve, but he wants a moment like what happened in the third set to be a teaching moment.

“It’s hard to prepare for that, but I still think we can do a better job. At this level, I don’t really feel how good the serve is, you can’t be giving up a run of 12 is ever acceptable,” said Poplawski.

“That’s the most disappointing part. I thought we did a lot of good things in the first two sets that we can build on, but to come out in the third and to not be able to contain that serve… we have to do a better job.”

MacEwan will wrap up their weekend series with Manitoba on Saturday (5 p.m., David Atkinson Gym, Canada West TV).

NOTABLE: Prior to the Griffins’ women’s contest on NAVC Night, Northern Alberta Volleyball Club president Brian Kim was on hand to present a scholarship to Griffins libero Solomon Flindall, an NAVC alum.