SPARTANS FALL TO NO. 9 BRANDON

BRANDON, Man. – No. 5-ranked Trinity Western fell to No. 9 Brandon in straight-sets (21-25, 17-25, 17-24) at the Healthy Living Centre on Saturday.
 
The Spartans (18-6) were led by eight kills from Aaron Elser (Calgary) as Bobcats (13-11) middle-blocker Philipp Lauter threw down 11 kills (.421 hitting percentage) and four blocks in TWU’s loss.
 
TWU struggled to play a clean match, making 14 attacking errors in the match. On the other end of the court, Brandon had eight.
 
AS IT HAPPENED
The Spartans played a tight first set, hitting .304 as a team, but Brandon powered past the Spartans to earn a 25-21 victory for a 1-0 lead.
 
The Bobcats played their cleanest set of the match in the second, hitting .429 as a team for a 25-17 victory in the second set.
 
The third, and final set of the night belonged to the Bobcats once again, taking another 25-17 set victory.
 
QUOTABLE
Adam Schriemer – Co-Interim Head Coach
“Tonight wasn’t the result we were looking for. The biggest phase we struggled in was the terminal serve battle – we missed too many serves for how aggressive we were serving. Brandon’s servers started to heat up, and we had too many dead balls. Because of that, we didn’t have too many rallies, so we couldn’t find our offensive rhythm.
 
“The Healthy Living Centre is a tough environment to play in, and Brandon puts pressure on you in a lot of different ways. It was a cool atmosphere to play U SPORTS volleyball in, and if you’re not sharp, you’re in trouble. That was the case tonight.”
 
NOTABLE

• The Spartans are 27-16 all-time against Brandon, winning eight of their last 10 in the matchup.
• Prior to Saturday’s match, TWU’s last loss to Brandon took place on Feb. 28, 2020.

 
UP NEXT
The Spartans rematch Brandon for a Canada West quarterfinal bout at the Langley Events Centre on Feb. 23. Catch all the action 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 and varsity disc golf. Since TWU entered U SPORTS in 1999, the Spartans have won 13 U SPORTS team championships and 32 Canada West team championships.

-TW-