Jefferson Hagen
MacEwan Athletics
EDMONTON – A comeback was unlikely when the final kill of Alexei Walisser‘s career seared the line cross court late in Set 3 to claw back a point for the Griffins to 23-18.
But the moment served as an exclamation mark on a great career, great season and great night for the graduating senior, who led everyone on the court with 15 kills in the last game of his incredible six-year multi-sport university athletics journey.
The victory went to the visiting Mount Royal University Cougars in straight sets (25-23, 25-20, 25-19), but the night belonged to Walisser, who was celebrated by his teammates post-game.
“I could definitely feel the emotions start to build up in that third set, but the boys helped keep me even keel,” said Walisser. “Alex (Lyndon) gave me some good offence tonight, so I was able to put up 15 kills, which was great. It’s nice to go out on a solid night.”
Walisser finishes the 2022-23 season with 289 kills, the second-most by anyone in the program’s Canada West history, behind only Max Vriend, who had 317 in 2019-20.
“Like I told the guys after the game – it’s not a game we’re going to dissect too much,” said Griffins head coach Brad Poplawski. “It’s more of a chance to honour Alexei in his last night and all he brought to the program in his four years.
“It was nice to see him have a big offensive output – five kills a set, pretty awesome – in his last U SPORTS match. It obviously wasn’t the result we wanted, but I thought he put up some nice numbers and got some big kills for us and some timely kills as well.”
Walisser finishes his career as a Griffin with 458 career kills – all in the last two seasons after he transferred to MacEwan in 2019-20 and redshirted for a season following stints in the Alberta Colleges Athletic Conference as a badminton athlete at King’s University (2016-17) and a volleyball player at Lakeland College (2017-19).
“It was such an honour to play here,” said Walisser, who is aiming to play pro overseas next fall. “It was such an honour to be able to play U SPORTS volleyball.
“It’s been an honour playing at a program where things don’t always come easy. You’ve got to earn everything here and that’s a life lesson I’ll carry on forever. It’s taught me a lot and it’s challenged me in so many ways, so I’m very thankful.”
With the result, the Griffins conclude the 2022-23 campaign with a 4-20 record, while MRU finishes 19-5 to place second in Canada West and will host cross-town rival Calgary in a best-of-three playoff quarter-final match next weekend.
MRU was led Saturday by Max Haronga, who had 12 kills and two aces, and Chris Byam (11 kills and three blocks) as their big spin serves were chief among the visitors’ effort to keep MacEwan out of system for much of the night.
“Their serving was really good today. (Numbers) 4 (Chris Byam) and 13 (Haronga) really had us on our heels a lot. They put a lot of velocity on the ball and definitely mixed different zones and seams, and made it challenging for our passers. Our guys battled through it. I agree, they kept us out of system a lot more tonight and they’re a good blocking team, very disciplined, so it was definitely more challenging for our outsides to score.
“They’re ranked where they are for a reason (No. 4 in U SPORTS) and they showed a bit of that tonight. I thought we had a really good chance in that first set and didn’t close it out. We just couldn’t sustain after that, and they kept the level pretty high.”
As was the case on Friday, the Griffins probably deserved a better fate in the opening set as they led for much of it before MRU wrested control with a late 7-1 run and won it on their second set-point opportunity when Byam put away one of his 11 kills off the block.
But the Cougars weren’t really threatened much at all in the final two sets Saturday and cruised to the finish.
Still, the young Griffins will head into an off-season with some momentum off a solid final stretch where they won three of their final six matches.
“We’re trying to build something here,” said Poplawski. “It’s hard and it’s challenging, but hopefully guys are excited by that challenge. I know that motivates me as a coach. We want to work with athletes that embrace that challenge and that a challenge is just an opportunity. “That’s what Alexei said post-game to our guys – he wants to leave the guys with that hard work (makes a difference) and modelling that behaviour.”
Griffins setter Lyndon had two service aces in the opening set to tie Max Vriend’s single season program record with 19 on the season.
“Last year, he started trying the spin serve in training, but in matches it was pretty much mostly all float,” noted Poplawski. “He’s worked really hard on that serve and it is a tough one. It’s an angle you don’t see a lot – a lefty that’s a curve opposite of a right hand. It’s like a pitcher in baseball coming at a different angle, different spin.
“It’s similar to the Alexei (story) – it’s all the hard work he put in in the off-season and in training to get that serve where it needs to be.”