TOUGH TO BEAR
U of A volleyball season comes to a crushing end
The University of Alberta Pandas won their first women’s university hockey national championship in seven years on Sunday night with a thrilling 2-1 double overtime victory over the McGill University Martlets of Montreal, and the game-winner came off the stick of an unlikely source.
Rookie defenceman Taylor Kezama’s shot beat McGill goaltender Tricia Deguire at the 8:13 mark of the second extra session in the tournament final Sunday in Napanee, Ont.
It was her first career goal. “With every period she seemed to get stronger and stronger and she played the best game of her season against McGill. It was fitting that she was the one that got the goal for us,” Pandas head coach Howie Draper said.
Alberta held a 1-0 lead after 40 minutes on a goal from Alex Poznikoff. McGill would tie it with a power-play marker early in the third.
The Pandas’ fifth-year goaltender Lindsey Post made 40 saves, including a series of huge stops on a McGill power play in overtime, to earn tournament MVP honours.
“It was a team win, but I don’t think anyone would disagree with me that we wouldn’t have won the championship without her,” Draper said.
“She was focused. She was poised. She never seemed rattled, and that’s what she brings to the table for us all the time.”
It marked the eighth national title for the Pandas, the most in U Sports history.
Brett Walsh couldn’t bear to watch.
As the Trinity Western Spartans raced on to the court at the Saville Community Sports Centre to celebrate their second-straight national championship, the fifth-year University of Alberta Golden Bears setter rushed over to console the rest of his teammates after losing in four sets (20-25, 20-25, 29-27, 23-25) on Sunday.
In an instant, the Golden Bears’ season was over and their incredible run as the No. 7 seed at the 2017 U Sports FOG national championship was over.
Despite having to settle for a silver medal, the Bears put together an incredibly gutsy performance this weekend. The Bears had a tough road to even get to the gold medal match, having to knock off the top three seeds in the tournament and arguably the three best teams in the country to win gold.
They almost pulled it off, but fell short of their goal of capturing what would have been their ninth national title in school history.
Taylor Arnett led the Bears with 16 kills, while Ryan Nickifor and Taryq Sani had 11 kills each. Sani also chipped in with 12 digs, while Walsh had 48 assists and eight digs.
“There’s anger, but there isn’t regret. We left it all out there as a team. But there’s a feeling of disappointment for sure, but I’m definitely proud to be a Golden Bear,” Walsh said.
Trinity Western entered as the tournament top dog, and the Spartans came out rolling in the opening set, leading from start to finish.
Alberta trailed by as many as five points a few times in the set and clawed their way back into it, but a couple service errors after the technical time out cut any momentum the Bears tried to generate.
“Trinity did a good job of keeping us on our toes,” Bears head coach Terry Danyluk said.
“I think we were a little too wound up to start the game and we let some easy balls drop to start the match. We fixed that, but when you’re playing a great team like Trinity, you can’t afford to do that.”
MATCHING MEDALS
In another national championship final, the University of Alberta completed the his and hers set of volleyball silver medals, this one by the Alberta Pandas.
One week after beating the University of British Columbia Thunderbirds to win the Canada West title, the Pandas fell to the T-Birds in four sets Sunday in the U Sports national championship in Toronto.
Alberta lost just three games all year long, and all three were against UBC.
“It’s heartbreaking,” Pandas head coach Laurie Eisler said. “I’m proud of how far our team had come this year, but it’s a devastating feeling right now.
“We didn’t have our best today.”