Vancouver – The No. 1 UBC Thunderbirds didn't show any hangover effects from their first CIS loss in 15 months on Friday, as they rebounded to take down the Brandon Bobcats 3-0 (25-17, 25-13, 25-16) Saturday night at War Memorial Gym.
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Lisa Barclay led all players with 13 kills on .296 hitting, but her consistent effort in the blocking game was just as important to head coach
Doug Reimer, who said his team looked much more ready for the Bobcats on Saturday, which allowed them to win all aspects of the match.
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"We did a much better job being prepared for them," said Reimer. "Lisa was very good offensively but she was also very good blocking, and Mariah [Bruinsma] was serving very well. When you have a couple people stepping up in those kinds of areas it has a nice flow-through effect with the rest of the group. I just thought in each facet we were stronger, we were faster in this game."
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The T-Birds had no trouble building leads on Friday, but they saw big cushions deflate in both the third and fourth sets as the Bobcats blockers heated up and reversed the momentum. This time the 'Birds avoided those pitfalls by changing up their points of attack, and they finished just as strong as they started.
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"Part of it was we just wanted to go at different areas and different zones, and make Brandon work hard in the middle for any success they were going to have there," Reimer said.
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UBC had eight blocks while Brandon had six, and the T-Birds outhit the Bobcats .270 to .048.
Kirsty Setterlund racked up 28 assists and helped four different T-Birds record at least seven kills.
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"Kirsty made good choices setting the ball and did pretty well in lots of areas today," Reimer said.
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Outside hitter
Juliana Kaufmanis had eight kills and
Rosie Schlagintweit added seven. Middle
Abbey Keeping also had eight kills on .400 hitting, adding a couple aces as part of a solid night at the service line, and led the 'Birds with two solo blocks and three block assists.
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Vaovai Aiono led the Bobcats with eight kills on .318 hitting. Alexis Loewen had five kills and hit .364, but they were the only two Brandon players with a hitting percentage above .000.
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The win keeps UBC's cushion at three games over Brandon, as they move to 15-1 while the Bobcats drop to 12-4 with six games remaining in the regular season. Trinity Western is also tied for second at 12-4.
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"Tonight was an important result for us in a lot of ways, but part of it is just in the standings," said Reimer. "We now have a three-match lead on Brandon and other teams, and frankly, we want to finish first to have a bye week and host the Final Four. We don't need to mess around with an extra playoff series and travelling, so we want to stay sharp and we want to improve."
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The Bobcats will play one home and one away match against Winnipeg next weekend. UBC will head to Calgary for two games against Mount Royal. Their next home games are January 31 and February 1 against Saskatchewan.
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