EDMONTON – The Alberta Golden Bears took another step closer to the Canada West Final Four with a quick 3-0 (25-19, 25-14, 25-15) win over the Brandon Bobcats Thursday night.
Brandon pushed the No. 1 ranked Trinity Western Spartans in the team’s last match but after the first few points it was all Alberta at the Saville Sports Centre.
The first two swings of the match for the Bobcats were both by Tom Friesen and both were for kills.
Jens Watt added another quickly making it three-for-three for Brandon, but Alberta answered back quickly and didn’t look back from there.
Billy Johnstone caught fire early going three-for-three on his first swings and adding a block before the technical time-out, which Alberta led 16-10.
Alberta got into a good spot mid-way through the first with first-team all-star Max Elgert serving, taking the Bears on a 9-3 run. The Bobcats were able to trim the deficit but not enough as Elgert ended it with an ace.
The Bobcats had seven serving errors in the first set.
The Bears set the tone early in the second with a big block from Johstone and Jordan Canham. Alberta slowly added to the lead, continuing to hit efficiently as a team.
Elgert continued his impressive game, not only finding attackers with accuracy allowing Alberta to score but also a timely dump late that took the Bears to set point.
The Bobcats moved Joao Cunha to the outside and Jens Watt to libero to start the third, but Alberta was just too comfortable and firing on all cylinders. Elgert ran a great offence all night allowing Canham, Kern and Johnstone to find and maintain a rhythm, hitting an astounding .867 in the final frame as a team.
Elgert finished with a match-high 33 assists and seven digs. Heslinga had a match-high nine kills while Jacob Deinum wasn’t far behind with seven on just 10 swings and no errors.
Johnstone and Canham finished with six kills each, Johnstone also registering three blocks.
The Bobcats were led by Friesen’s team-high eight kills while Jake Fleming had 24 assists.
The Golden Bears will now enjoy a night off before resuming action on Saturday against the Winnipeg Wesmen.
The Bobcats will look to regroup quickly as they take on the Wesmen back at the Saville Centre in Edmonton Friday.
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