The Keyano Huskies Women’s Volleyball team suffered a setback in Edmonton this past weekend as their seven-game winning streak came to an abrupt halt with two five-set losses against the Concordia Thunder.
“There was definitely moments where we played at a level where we need to play, but in all honesty, it was just way too inconsistent,” Head Coach Hayden Nichol said. “That was pretty much every part of our game, especially on the Friday night. Serving was a big issue and defence, which is two things we’re normally pretty solid at and we really got exposed in a couple ways that weren’t used to.
“We didn’t pass the mental part of the game either.”
Friday, the Huskies fell in five sets (25-21, 23-25, 25-15, 20-25, 13, 13-15). Tyneille Neufeld led the way with 18 kills and Megan Polant had 16 kills for a season-high performance, but it couldn’t carry the Huskies to a win on this night. Karlene Kaminski had 12 kills to make it a trio of double-digit kill performances on the visitor’s side of the net.
Stokes and Neufeld each had 30 digs. Rebecca Maxwell added 48 assists, 19 digs, and eight kills in the match.
Saturday’s five-set loss followed a different pattern with the same end result (23-25, 22-25, 25-20, 25-23, 13-15) as the Thunder coughed up a two-sets-to-none lead, but regained the lead in the deciding fifth set.
Neufeld had 22 kills and Kaminski had 15 on her own. The duo also recorded 15 and 20 digs, respectively. Stokes led the visiting Huskies with 32 digs, while Maxwell added 51 assists and 15 digs to her stat line.
While the losses are unfortunate and represent a missed opportunity, the Huskies are still in the thick of the playoff picture for the Alberta Colleges Athletic Conference’s (ACAC) North Division. At 9-4, they’re tied for third place with this coming weekend’s opponent, the University of Alberta – Augustana Vikings.
Also awaiting the Huskies is a two-game set against The King’s University Eagles, who hold an 11-1 record while challenging for the top spot in the division. With this weekend’s results, Nichol isn’t discounting anyone left on their schedule.
“The top four in our division and now maybe after this weekend the top five in our division are very strong teams and anyone can beat anyone,” he said. “Knowing that in the next two weeks we have the most challenging two weeks of our season coming up, we’ve got to use this weekend as motivation as opposed to staying down on ourselves and dwelling on what went on this weekend.
“It’s important for us to move on pretty quickly.”
First serve on Friday is scheduled for 6:00 p.m. with a 1:00 p.m. first serve scheduled Saturday at the Syncrude Sport and Wellness Centre.
