Left side Abby Guezen blasted 33 kills to lead the fourth-seeded Alberta Pandas to a 3-2 (25-21, 21-25, 25-18, 22-25, 18-16) victory over the No. 1 Manitoba Bisons in semifinal action at the U Sports women’s volleyball championship in Hamilton, Ont., Saturday night.
The Pandas overcame three match points by the Bisons to win the fifth set, rallying from an early 7-4 deficit to advance to Sunday’s final against the No. 2 UBC Thunderbirds.
Light Uchechukwu had 13 kills for the Bisons in Saturday’s semifinal.
“It’s obviously really, really devastating for this team and especially with how courageously we fought in this match,” said Bisons head coach Ken Bentley via telephone. “I mean, you couldn’t ask for more. We just played our butts off and right to the bitter end. But that’s what national semifinals are — you can’t wish for easy, they’re going to be hard and we were totally ready for it. And no excuses. We were just two points short in the end.”
Raya Surinx, who missed Manitoba’s 3-1 quarter-final triumph over St. Mary’s Huskies on Friday while nursing an ailing right ankle, had 20 kills to lead Manitoba.
“She was good enough to play and our goal was to make the final (Sunday) and deal with tomorrow when it came,” said Bentley. “Certainly no regrets on playing her and the strategy we took. Obviously, it was two points away from working. I thought she still played great. I mean, in the fifth set she served two big points there — just nerves of steel. She did the best she could at whatever she was — 70 per cent? I don’t know what the percentage was but it wasn’t 100.”
Light Uchechukwu added 13 kills and 17 digs for the Herd, while other big hitters included Ella Gray, with 11, Brenna Bedosky, with nine, and Eve Catojo, with seven. Setter Katreena Bentley had 52 assists for the Bisons.
Meanwhile, Alberta’s Guezen went 33-for-64 and a stellar .406 attacking percentage while teammate Lauryn Tremblay added 11.
Setter Katreena Bentley had 52 assists for Manitoba.
“It’s always fun playing the Bisons — it’s never not been fun,” said Pandas libero Kalysta Knappett, who had a game-high 34 digs. “They’re always going to show up, which really makes us have to show up. They’ve got some amazing hitters and sometimes you just have to do your best and you’ve got to be desperate sometimes to get a ball just up even a foot off the floor.”
Alberta’s third-year setter Justine Kolody, a Winnipeg product, registered 55 assists.
“I think extending rallies was huge and just making sure if they were gonna win that match they’d have to really earn it,” said Pandas head coach Carolyn O’Dwyer. “It wasn’t necessarily pretty, but just kind of sticking with it and making them do more than one good thing to win a point. I think we were successful just being patient.”
The loss relegated Manitoba to the bronze-medal game at the national championship for the second consecutive year. The Bisons will take on the No. 6 Acadia Axeman, who dropped a 3-0 (25-16, 25-8, 25-21) to UBC in the other semifinal.
“On a scale of one to 10 — 10 being really hard — it will be a 12,” said Bentley of preparing his team for another match after such a heart-breaking defeat. “It’s a tough match to play. We have no choice but to play it. I will watch film till my eyes bleed. I will do what I have to do to get ready for the match and we have to play. We have to do our best. That’s just what we’re charged with.”
