MONTREAL – Victoria Iannotti returned to the lineup with a splash, scoring a game-high 15.5 points as McGill swept the Université de Québec à Chicoutimi 25-16, 25-19 and 25-12 in women’s volleyball at Love Competition Hall, Friday.
More commonly known as UQAC, the Inuk are a new program in the RSEQ conference this season, as the league expanded to eight teams. The Martlets improved to 4-2, two wins behind division-leading Sherbrooke (6-1), with a game in hand. UQAC remained winless, dropping to 0-7.
It was a wide-open affair that featured a combined 74 kills, 11 aces and 92 digs with only seven total blocks.
“We didn’t know much about UQAC and they were a pretty good defensive team. But they are smaller so they were moving their hands a lot while we were blocking and it was hard for us to play defence behind that,” said McGill head coach Rachele Beliveau. “They were always getting a piece of the ball on their hands, so we decided not to block any more. That helped and we just focussed on playing defence against their attack”
Iannotti, who missed three weeks with an upper-body injury suffered in practice, tallied her points on the strength of 12 kills, a pair of service aces and 1.5 stuff blocks. She had a team-leading 2.27 passing ratio (out of 3) and added 10 digs with one assist on defence.
The only other member of the Martlets to reach double digits was Charlene Robitaillewith 11, derived from five kills and an impressive tally of six aces. She also registered a team-high 13 digs, along with one assist.
Playing a last-place team gave McGill head coach the opportunity to work the entire 12-member dress roster into the contest and to experiment with a different alignment.
“We played for the first time with a 6-2 system,” Beliveau noted. “We had two setters on the court at the same time and they were both hitting when on the front row and setting when on the back row. We’ve practiced it a little bit and wanted to try it today because the two setters that we used today can both hit. Selima had a pretty good game with five kills and 33 per cent efficiency, while Charlotte had six kills. So it was good to see that we can use that system if we need it in a game.
“We are happy to have three good setters who can hit this year because we had so many injury problems with two setters last year, so this gives us more flexibility. With Selima, she may be a rookie but she already knows the game very well as her father is the coach at U de M men’s volleyball program and she has played for a long time. This is something that gives us flexibility and we will explore more in the future.”
UQAC (0-7) will remain in town to confront UQAM (3-2) on Saturday at 1 p.m., while McGill (4-2) will have a day to prepare for a road game at Ottawa (2-3) on Sunday (Nov. 5) at 1 p.m.
MARTLET MURMURS: Senior middle blocker Meaghan Smith, who has missed the last four matches with an undisclosed injury, is expected back in the lineup next week
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