NO. 8 SPARTANS SETTLE FOR SPLIT WITH NO. 7 THUNDERBIRDS

VANCOUVER, British Columbia – Fourth-year outside Henry Rempel (Swift Current, Sask.) hit for a career-best 26 kills, at .429, with five digs, and two aces, but it wasn’t enough as the No. 8 Trinity Western Spartans fell 3-2 to the No. 7 UBC Thunderbirds Friday night at War Memorial Gym in Vancouver, B.C. The 25-23, 22-25, 22-25, 30-28, 15-13 loss drops the Spartans to 12-8, while the win moves the Thunderbirds to 14-6.

Second-year outside Kaden Schmidt (Mississauga, Ont.) with 15 kills, five digs, and two blocks, and third-year middle Jackson Corneil (Surrey, B.C.) with nine kills, and six blocks also had strong nights for the Spartans. Reeve Gingera with 20 kills, four blocks, and two aces, Gavin Moes with 15 kills, and four digs, and Conaire Taub with eight kills led the Thunderbirds.
 
TWU third-year setter Anselm Rein finished with 55 set assists, five blocks and two aces, while UBC’s setter Mason Greves finished with 46 assists, and 12 digs.
 
AS IT HAPPENED
Neither team was able to create much separation early in the first set, but after a 10-10 tie the T-Birds ripped off a 6-1 run led by a kill and block by Conaire Taub. The Spartans, however, then went on a 7-2 run of their own coming out of a timeout to tie the score at 18.
 
The Thunderbirds responded once again with an ace and kill on back-to-back plays by Moes making it 21-18. TWU continued to fight, but Gingera closed out the set with a kill to make it 25-23.
 
The Spartans got off to a strong start in the second, but UBC again battled right back into it and retook the lead. An ace from Kieran Robinson-Dunning put the hosts up 17-13, and the T-Birds maintained the lead through to 22-20.
 
Unfortunately, disaster struck at that point as the Spartans grabbed all the momentum and reeled off a 5-0 run to take the set 25-22 and even up the match.
 
UBC briefly held the lead early in the third after a Taub kill made it 7-6, but TWU jumped out in front with a quick 4-1 burst to force a timeout. The Thunderbirds continued to fight hard throughout the rest of the set, not letting the Spartans get out in front by more than a couple points.
 
A late kill from Robinson-Dunning cut the lead to 22-21 in favour of the visitors, but the Spartans were able to hang on to their lead and take it 25-22 for the second straight set.
 
Trinity Western, riding high after consecutive set wins, jumped out to a 5-2 lead in the fourth. But three kills in quick succession from Moes cut the lead to just one, before UBC eventually knotted things up midway through the set.
 
Neither team could pull away in the second half of the set, with the two teams pushing past the 25-point barrier. The Thunderbirds racked up a total of five set points before they were finally able to close it out at 30-28.
 
Robinson-Dunning was a force to begin the fifth set, with three kills in a row before combining with Taub on a block to make it 6-3 UBC. A kill from Taub soon after made it 9-5, before the Spartans made another run with four unanswered points to tie it.
 
The final stage of the match was when Gingera revealed he was saving his best for last. Back-to-back aces from the second-year outside hitter made it 14-11, and after the Spartans scored the next two it was Gingera who got the kill to end it at 15-13.
 
QUOTABLE
TWU Head Coach Adam Schriemer
“I’m really proud of our guys for how tough and together we were. War Memorial isn’t an easy place to play and I thought we stuck together. That second set was a really good example of that. We showed a lot of resilience to come back. I think the biggest thing as the game went on was we lost the terminal serve battle and that really hurt us. When you play a team as good as UBC in an environment like that, the margins are so slim. I thought we had some opportunities in the fourth and fifth sets to make some plays and if we convert on one or two of those, things could have been different. The nice part is we just got more experience playing in these tough environments and this is the atmosphere we need to continue to get more comfortable playing in. We’ll learn from it and be better for it.”
 
 
 
NOTABLE

• TWU finished the night hitting .356 (63-21-118), while UBC finished hitting at .278 (55-20-126).
• The Thunderbirds had a 10-6 edge in service aces.
• UBC had the edge in blocks 10-9.
• The Spartans finished with 38 digs to the Thunderbirds 32.
• Rempel’s previous best was 23, which he set most recently on October 28 in Winnipeg.
• The Spartans are 60-27 lifetime against the Thunderbirds.
• The Spartans have won 9 of their last 13 matches against the Thunderbirds.
• TWU defeated UBC 3-1 Thursday night in Langley, B.C.

 
UP NEXT
The Spartans will now return home for senior weekend when they will host the MacEwan Griffins for the final conference games on February 9-10. Start times at the Langley Events Centre are set for 7 p.m. (PT) and 6 p.m. (PT) and can be seen live on Canada West TV.

About Spartan Athletics
As official members of U SPORTS, the Spartans currently compete in 13 sports in the Canada West conference, including women’s and men’s soccer, volleyball, basketball, hockey, cross country, and track & field, as well as women’s rugby sevens. TWU also competes as an independent team in men’s rugby. Since TWU entered U SPORTS in 1999, the Spartans have won 14 U SPORTS team championships and 34 Canada West team championships.
 
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