The Camosun Chargers defeated the University of the Fraser Valley men’s volleyball team in three sets on Friday evening, but the game was more closely contested than your typical three-set sweep.
Each of the three sets was decided by the minimum two-point margin, with each one breaking the Chargers’ way (30-28, 25-23, 25-23).
With his team on the razor’s edge between winning and losing all night, Cascades head coach Kyle Donen felt the difference was defence.
“We couldn’t make a dig when we needed to,” he said afterward. “I thought our offence was running all right, but they made a couple digs and we just couldn’t match them on defence at times. The game was that close, and the difference was one or two digs. We just couldn’t get them.”
Both teams came in ranked nationally – the Chargers are No. 12 in the latest Canadian Colleges Athletic Association (CCAA) national poll, while the Cascades are No. 14.
Camosun improved to 8-3, good for second place in the PacWest, while UFV fell to 6-5.
Joel Kleingeltink led the Cascades with nine kills, while Josh Togeretz and Robert Bauerfind had seven apiece and Robert Koenig chipped in with six kills and a team-high three blocks.
UFV appeared to have something cooking midway through the third set, building a four-point lead, but the Chargers rallied to finish the game off.
The two teams meet again on Saturday at 3 p.m. at UFV’s Student Activity Centre North Gym.
“We know we can be better than we were tonight,” Donen said. “We had a lead in the third set and what appeared to be the momentum in the game, but we kind of let that slip away. If we’d won that set, it might have changed the game.
“We’ve got to take care of business a little earlier on in the match. We let a team that came off the ferry tonight steal one from us, I thought.”
Comments are closed.