Clippers 3 Queens 1
The RDC Queens still have some work to do to be consistently at the level they need to be come playoff time.
The Queens showed Friday just how good they can be with a 3-1 victory over the Briercrest Bible College Clippers.
On Saturday afternoon they showed they still need some fine tuning as they dropped a 20-25, 25-15, 18-25, 12-25 decision to the Clippers in Alberta Colleges Women’s Volleyball League action at RDC.
“We didn’t have a grasp of the controllable skills,” said Queens head coach Talbot Walton shaking his head. “We didn’t serve exceptionally well … we served soft. Didn’t set well and didn’t make good choices on hitting. Those are the three skills we can control and we didn’t do a good enough job of that. We tried to rely solely on our defence and Briercrest hits the ball too well to rely strictly on defence to beat them.”
In the second set the Queens looked as if they were going to return to Friday’s form, but despite the lopsided win it was only an illusion.
The Queens managed to record only seven kills in each of the third and fourth sets.
While the Clippers looked like the team ranked fourth in Canada, Walton felt they gave them too many free chances.
“They were running their offence off free balls and anyone can get a lot of momentum off free balls,” he said.
The weekend split didn’t help the Queens goal of moving up in the standings as they sit at 10-6 with BBC at 14-4.
Despite a disappointing performance Saturday, Walton will use both Friday and Saturday as a positive.
“Friday was like we should be. We can’t take much out of today but it was one of those games the girls will remember and will give them motivation and help them in the future.”
Miranda Dawe was player of the match for RDC with 10 kills, three aces, a block and 22 digs. Kelsey Tymkow had five kills, libero Olivia Barnes 10 digs. Ashley Fehr, who came in late in the first set and played all of the second and some of the third, had 15 assists, two kills and five digs. Starting setter Meagan Kuzyk had 10 assists, an ace and four digs.
Mikayla Reinhardt had 17 kills, two aces and 13 digs and Samantha Zacharias 10 kills, four aces and 10 digs for BBC.
Kings 3 Clippers 1
Despite the 25-23, 21-25, 25-16, 25-20 victory Kings head coach Aaron Schulha wasn’t overly pleased.
“Too many errors,” he said. “We missed too many serves and were inconsistent. I was telling the (assistant) coaches at the end of the game we survived the weekend knowing how banged up we are and had limited options coming in off the bench.
“It was nice to get through the weekend. If we were playing Medicine Hat we could have lost one of the matches, maybe both.
“It was a rude awakening and it was good to have that and get the Ws.”
Still the Clippers, who have a 6-12 record with RDC at 15-1, played much better than they did in a 3-1 loss Friday.
“We had to expect them to come out today like they played late yesterday and they did that,” said Schulha. “They’re fighting for their playoff lives and every win is important for them. Every win is important for us as well, but for a different reason.”
Schulha liked the way the Kings played when they were on a run, but not when they let down.
“When we were clean we went on a significant run and when we made errors they went on a significant run. We can see what we’re capable of when we play clean and how ugly it looks when we make errors.”
Schulha did get a chance to use backup setter Ryan Beatson in the second set and Kashtin De Souza came in off the bench for starter Regan Fathers and was solid.
“Ryan is an energy guy,” said Schulha. “He gives up a bit of height but provides something different (than Luke Brisbane) and is a good defender. Kash and Matt (Lofgren) are our passing left sides and Kash came in for Regan and did what we wanted.”
De Souza had five kills, an ace, a block and six digs. Beatson had 11 assists. Riley Friesen was the player of the match for the Kings with 19 kills, two aces, three blocks and seven digs while Lofgren had seven kills and seven digs and middle Tom Lyon six kills, an ace, four digs and two blocks. Ty Moorman had four kills, four digs and four blocks. Brisbane finished with 31 assists, two kills and seven digs.
Mitch Erickson had 14 kills and setter Carter Reimer three kills, nine digs and 30 assists for BBC.
The RDC teams face Ambrose University College in a home-and-home series next weekend – Friday at Ambrose and Saturday at RDC.