VANCOUVER – The UBC Thunderbirds (7-3) are going into the extended winter break on a high, picking up their second straight 3-0 sweep (25-13, 25-22, 25-19) over the MacEwan Griffins (0-10) at War Memorial Gym on Saturday.
The T-Birds finish the first half of the Canada West season on a five-match winning streak, also holding a perfect 5-0 record at home. After losing their first two matches to begin the campaign, the T-Birds have ripped off a torrid 7-1 run going into the break.
“Winning in Canada West isn’t easy,” mused UBC head coach Mike Hawkins, after Saturday’s victory. “So as much as we would love to have those three games back that we lost, this is just such a difficult conference so kudos to our guys staying patient when things started off a little bit rocky.”
While MacEwan did not pick up a set in their trip to Point Grey, the Griffins quickly rebounded from a tough first frame on Saturday and gave the T-Birds everything they could handle for the rest of the match.
The contest started out as a back and forth affair, as the teams traded points until the score reached 7-7. From there the ‘Birds took off, going on a 7-1 run, with four different players picking up kills. UBC’s 14-8 advantage ballooned behind efficient attacking, as the home side hit .500 in the set overall to take it 25-13.
The second set was the most dramatic of the match, with the T-Birds holding a very slim lead for most of it. The Griffins proved resilient and pulled even at 21-21 off of a Mitchell Croft kill, one of his team-leading 13 on the evening.
The play of the match, or the near-play of the match, came late in the frame from GMU’s Kenneth Ang. After an attempted dig by one of his teammates in the back row went awry, Ang sprinted around the right stanchion supporting the net and managed to knock a no-look set back over his head just before running into the wall, seemingly saving what appeared to be a sure shank. However, the referee ruled that Ang’s pass went over the boundary pole rather than around it, so despite his valiant effort the point was awarded to UBC.
The T-Birds would go on to win the set 25-22, finished by emphatic block of Croft by Gavin Moes and Jesse Umoren.
Set three started with a 4-1 UBC run, but MacEwan gradually battled back to cut the advantage to 11-10 and draw a T-Birds timeout.
Whatever Coach Hawkins said in that stoppage must have resonated with his team, as the ‘Birds rattled off five straight points when they got back on the floor, including three Reeve Gingera kills.
The Griffins never got closer than a four-point deficit from there, as both teams gave their bench players time on the floor before the match concluded with a 25-19 T-Birds win.
“I said to the guys at the beginning of the third set that our block defence had solidified and maybe we weren’t getting the results in stuff blocks but keep forcing them to hit shots that they didn’t want to,” said Hawkins. “They had 19 attack errors, which means we put them in difficult positions. It doesn’t show up in the number of stuffed blocks, but I think the way we were able to hold them below their peak efficiency, so kudos to our defence tonight.”
Both teams now take more than a month off before starting their second semester schedule.
“We know that we’re not trying to win a national championship in October, we’re trying to do it in March, and all throughout this semester there’s just been phases of our game that continued to improve,” concluded Hawkins.
“That’s really what the end of October and November was for us. So now we get the opportunity to go back to the drawing board a little bit over the break, head to Hawaii for an exhibition and hit the ground running in January.”
MacEwan is back in action on Friday, January 10th when they host the UFV Cascades. The ‘Birds begin the new year in Kelowna, taking on the UBCO Heat for a back-to-back with the first match on the 10th as well. UBC’s next match at War Memorial Gym is on January 24th against the Manitoba Bisons.
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