M-VOLLEYBALL ROUNDUP: Gaels upset no. 8 Gryphons in straight sets
On Saturday afternoon the Gaels (3-3) handily defeated the No.8 Guelph Gryphons (6-2) in three straight sets, 25-17, 25-18 and 25 – 23 for the upset win at the ARC in Kingston.
Saturday, Nov. 15
Guelph 0 @ Queen's 3
On Saturday afternoon the Gaels (3-3) handily defeated the No.8 Guelph Gryphons (6-2) in three straight sets, 25-17, 25-18 and 25 – 23 for the upset win at the ARC in Kingston.
In the first set, Queen's opened the scoring and maintained a five-point lead. The Gaels were unstoppable with Mike Tomlinson(Stratford, Ont.), Philippe Goyer (Ottawa) and Markus Trence(Orangeville, Ont.) leading the attack from both sides of the court, allowing the Gaels to pull away taking the Gryphons 25-17.
In the second set, Guelph picked up their intensity catching the Gaels off guard and pressuring them into making mistakes but it was not enough to derail the Gaels as Queen's overtook Guelph 25–18. In the final set, the Gryphons took their first lead opening the scoring but the Gaels maintained composure to take back the lead. With a nail-biter of a finish, Guelph tied the score at 22- 22 but two back-to-back attacking errors by the Gryphons ended the set 25-23 in favour of Queen's.
The Gaels led a relentless attack against the Gryphons, Tomlinson cleaned up the match with 15 kills, one serving ace and four digs. Trence finished with 12 kills and seven digs and Goyer with 11 kills, two serving aces and five digs of his own. Just as powerful as the attack, Queen's defence was on point with Tyler Scheerhoorn (Belleville, Ont.) making six blocks and two digs and Ivo Dramov (Plovdiv, Bulgaria) achieving a game high of 15 digs to maintain the lead for the Gaels.
Ryerson 3 @ York 2
The York University Lions men's volleyball team was narrowly defeated by the Ryerson Rams in a thrilling five-set contest on Saturday (Nov. 15) at Tait McKenzie Centre.
Both teams provided a tight competition for each other. The Rams recorded two wins in the first two sets at 25-20 and 26-24. Refusing to back down, the Lions won the next two sets at 25-20 and 25-22. The Lions displayed an unwavering attitude until the last set that eventually ended with the Rams winning 16-14.
The Rams took an early lead at the first set with brilliant plays. At the first timeout, the scoreline read 6-2 in favour of the visiting team.
Ray Szeto (Sutton, Ont.) kept the Lions alive with crucial digs. The Rams Lucas Coleman aided the opposition by repeatedly overhitting his serves.
Accurate spikes by the home team helped tighten the margin. The Lions eventually tied the game for the first time in the set at 17-17. However, a series of errors by the team squandered the scoring streak as the opposition came out the first set winners.
The Rams started strong in the second set with perfect set-ups for the spikes. At the first timeout of the set, the Rams were dominating at 10-3. The Lions had trouble defending their spaces.
Szeto stepped up to lead the team's attack with spikes that rooted the opponents. Eventually, the Lions were able to catch up at 15-20.
An intense rally ended in the Lions scoring at 21-23. Alexander Duncan-Thibault (Scarborough, Ont.) aided in the defence.
Szeto's block extended the set into a deuce. However, Ryerson's Robert Wojcik's serve won the set.
The Lions took an early lead before the Rams called a timeout at 4-0. The scoring went back and forth until the next timeout, in which the Lions were leading 11-9.
The Rams revamped the squad with a simultaneous substitution of three players. Despite the constant changes in the line-up, the Rams were unable to hold off the Lions in the third set.
Josh Henderson (Scarborough, Ont.) starred in the fourth set with accurate hits towards the opponents' court. The game remained tight at 9-9.
The Lions saw an appeal for out-of-bounds denied with a yellow card awarded to the team. Soon after the incident, Henderson unleashed a thundering spike that felled the Rams' Adam Anagnostopoulos at 15-14.
Nikola Sandic (Etobicoke, Ont.) provided perfect assists for Duncan-Thibault to kill. Sandic eventually ended the game with an impressive tally of 49 assists.
Arthur Swarcsz (Toronto) subbed in at the last minute to score the set-winning spike.
The Lions came close to a dramatic comeback victory in the tie-breaking set as they snatched the lead again at 4-1 before the first timeout. Unfortunate errors by the team tightened the scoreline for the remaining moments.
The Rams led with a match-point that was eventually deuced by the Lions at the next timeout. The Rams stamped their victory with a serve that grazed the net and into the opponents' court.
Szeto recorded 16 kills, one ace and two blocks. Ryerson's Lucas Coleman achieved 21 kills, two aces and a block.
Waterloo 3 @ RMC 3
On Saturday afternoon the Warriors earned their second straight sets victory (25-12, 25-15, 25-13) of the season against the struggling RMC Paladins. Rookie Braden Cok(Waterloo) was impressive in the outing scoring 5 kills, 7 digs, 2 blocks and 3 service aces. Waterloo gets back to .500 and moves to 4-4 on the season.
The Warriors have lost some tough matches this season against some top teams in the OUA and they knew this was a match that needed to be won. In a mismatch of skill, head coach Chris Lawson was able to get every player on the roster into at least one set for some valuable experience.
Waterloo won the match in lopsided fashion and gained some much needed confidence moving into the final two weeks before the holiday break. Erich Woolley (New Dundee)racked up 3 digs in the contest which puts him into the lead in the OUA.
Leading the Warriors was Cok and Jordan McConkey (Stratford) with 6 kills (2nd hitting percentage in OUA), 4 digs, 2 service aces and 3 solo blocks. Nikola Dimitrijevic(Mississauga) scored 26 assists on the evening which leads the OUA.
RMC struggled throughout much of the match but Adam Lupton had 5 kills and 3 digs while Blake McClelland had 5 kills, 7 assists and 10 digs in the losing effort.
Toronto 3 @ Nipissing 2
It would be have a well-deserved win for the Nipissing Lakers men's volleyball team.
They played well, they fought hard, they did everything right, they just couldn't pull the win out in the end, as they fell in five sets to the Toronto Varsity Blues.
Each team dominated a set, each team squeaked out a win in a set, but it was Toronto who walked away with a 15-12 win in the fifth set to claim the match.
Toronto won sets one and four – 25-17 and 26-24 – with the Lakers responding and winning sets two and three 26-24 and 25-12.
In a back and forth fifth set, the Blues led by a handful and looked to be on their way to victory, but the Lakers closed the gap and dug deep, but in the end, fell short.
Andy McWiggan led the Lakers attack with 19 kills and 21 points, while Lyndon Sonego and Warren Taylor each recorded 12 kills.
Steve Wood and Taylor would huge contributor in the blocking game as well, picking up a number of huge stuff blocks.
Despite the loss, the Lakers can gain confidence from the way they played and will look to carry that into tomorrow when they host the Ryerson Rams.
Sunday, Nov. 16
Ryerson 3 @ Nipissing 1
For the second straight match, the Nipissing Lakers men's volleyball team played well enough to win, but weren't rewarded for their efforts.
After losing a five set heartbreak, the Lakers dropped a well-played four set decision to the Ryerson Rams Sunday afternoon.
After opening up the match with a 25-22 victory, the Lakers came up short in the next three, including an exciting 28-26 setback in set three.
The Rams closed things down in the fourth set, stifling any attempted comeback by the Lakers and sending them to the loss.
The Lakers played eight very strong sets this weekend, but were unable to pick up their first victory of the season.
Lyndon Sonego led the Lakers Sunday, piling up 14 kills while Andrew McWiggan had another solid effort, scoring 10 kills.
Warren Taylor chipped in with five kills and five blocks for Nipissing.
Sunday's game capped off a four match homestand for the Lakers, who now hit the road four two matches this weekend against Western and Windsor.
Following this road trip, the Lakers will finish off the semester hosting RMC and Queens at the end of the month.
Waterloo 3 @ Queen's 1
On Sunday afternoon the Gaels (3-4) were defeated by the Waterloo Warriors (5-4) in four sets 3-1 with set scores 25-15,25-23, 25-27 and 28-26.
Waterloo opened the scoring in the first set and the points went back and forth between the two teams until the 14-point mark when the Warriors pulled away to take the Gaels 25-15. Queen's had a slow start with their attacks being shut down by the Warriors strong defenseive play.
The Gaels trailed Waterloo throughout the entire second set but just when it seemed like the Warriors had the game in the bag, Queen's turned up the heat to close an eight-point gap to down to one point at 24-23. Unfortunately it wasn't enough to take the set as Waterloo finished with a kill from second year Aaron Wiersman.
In the third set Markus Trence (Orangeville, Ont.) opened the scoring for the Gaels off a kill catching Waterloo off guard. Queen's came out challenging Waterloo's attacking capabilities with defensive blocks from Mike Tomlinson(Stratford, Ont.) and Tyler Scheerhoorn (Belleville, Ont.). The scoring went back and forth with both teams holding their own in rallies but the Gaels managed to overtake Waterloo with an attacking error by a Warrior player to take the set 27-25.
In the fourth frame, again the teams were neck and neck, neither able to pull away bringing the match right down to the wire. Queen's had the opportunity to take the fourth set at game-point but Waterloo's Zachary Doherty produced two back-to-back kills and an unfortunate attacking error by Scheerhoorn ended the game for the evening 3-1 for the Warriors.
On the attack, Tomlinson had the game-high of 16 kills and 10 digs while Trence came close with 15 kills and 12 digs for the Gaels. Queen's libero Ivo Dramov (Plovdiv, Bulgaria) held down the fort for the Gaels with 20 outstanding digs to stop Waterloo attacks. Waterloo led a strong attack with five of their players getting over 10 kills each against the Gaels.
Toronto 1 @ York 3
The York University Lions men's volleyball team came back from a set deficit to three consecutive set wins against the Toronto Varsity Blues on Sunday (Nov. 16) at Tait McKenzie Centre.
Despite losing the first set to the Blues by a score of 20-25, the Lions came back with three set wins afterwards at 25-17, 25-22 and 26-24.
The visitors gave the home team a scare after scoring the first four points of the game. Attempted spikes by the Lions were repeatedly blocked by the opposition. A timeout by the Lions revived the team after a tactical change.
The Lions continuously sent the ball towards the opponent's back line, where the Blues had trouble keeping it in play. Alexander Duncan-Thibault (Scarborough, Ont.) hammered down spikes that were too difficult to save. Eventually, the team was able to decrease the margin to 13-15.
With a series of brilliant plays, the Blues reopened the gap. The Blues Trevor Grant scored the set-winning spike.
The Lions displayed a solid performance in the following set.
Nikola Sandic (Etobicoke, Ont.) delivered serves that caused trouble in the Blues court. By the first timeout, the Lions lead 10-6.
Rookie outside-hitter Josh Henderson (Scarborough, Ont.) made major contributions with vital blocks and kills that led to the set win.
A brilliant stint of Duncan-Thibault's serves aided the Lions to an 8-6 lead. The player finished with three aces by the end of the game.
Both teams provided an exciting competition as the Blues caught up from trailing 11-15 to equalising at 15-15. The rest of the set remained tight, but the Lions eventually won the set.
The Lions found themselves scrambling at the start of the fourth set. Illegal digs committed by the Lions gave the Blues an advantage in the game.
Ray Szeto (Sutton, Ont.) troubled the Blues with his dangerous spikes. Henderson ended a long rally with a diagonal spike to an open area. The Lions were able to equalise at 11-11. The set remained tense until the very end, when the home team denied a deuce through a Duncan-Thibault block.
Among the star players of the game, Henderson achieved 22 kills, 10 digs and two assists. Sandic finished with 55 assists and two aces.
The Blues Thomas Meier recorded 17 kills and two digs. Michael Denton made 44 assists, eight digs and one solo block.
Other Scores
Guelph 3 @ RMC 1