MVB: Spartans Open Week 2 With Three-Set Win

ABBOTSFORD, B.C. - Trinity Western's men's volleyball team earned their fourth straight win in the Canada West postseason, beating Saskatchewan 3-0 (25-17, 25-18, 25-20) Friday at the UFV Athletics Centre.

Winning the battle from the baseline, the Spartans had a 9-1 edge in aces, which sparked TWU to a convincing victory in the opening match of Week 2 of the conference playoffs.

Canada West First Team All-Star Brodie Hofer (Langley, B.C.) led the Spartans with 12 kills, while Jesse Elser (Calgary) had seven kills, three aces and six digs for TWU. Jordan Schnitzer (Surrey, B.C.) hit .700 from the middle, with seven kills on 10 attempts, while Second Team All-Star Jackson Howe (Calgary) hit .667 with five kills on six attempts. First Team All-Star Derek Epp (Saskatoon) had 23 assists to go with two kills and four digs.

Saskatchewan was led by Second Team All-Star Dylan Mortensen, who had seven kills. Quinn Buchanan and Skyler Varga each had five kills and three blocks.

TWU finished with a .368 hitting percentage, while Saskatchewan hit .250. Both teams had 17 service errors.

The Huskies will now play Calgary Saturday night at 7 p.m. (PT) at the UFV Athletics Centre in a situation where they have to win to save their season. The Spartans will play the Dinos Sunday at 4 p.m. (PT) at the Langley Events Centre, with a win over Calgary earning TWU the right to host the Canada West Final Four (Mar. 18-19).

AS IT HAPPENED
Saskatchewan came out swinging in the first set, hitting .538 as a team without making a single attacking error. However, the Spartans had a 6-0 edge in aces, turning the tides in TWU's favour. Hofer had four kills in the first set to lead the Spartans, who hit .353, to an eight-point win.

After going without a block in the first set, TWU found its defensive rhythm, earning three blocks in the second set to slow down the Saskatchewan attack. Hofer had five kills in the set for TWU, while Mortensen had a second straight three-kill set. The Huskies had a 5-3 advantage in blocks through two sets.

TWU struggled from the service line in the third set, committing eight errors and only garnering one ace, but with the Spartans hitting .414 in the set, they were able to hold on for a five-point win. The Huskies also committed four serving errors in the final set of the night.

QUOTABLE
TWU Head Coach Ben Josephson
"We served well in the first two sets and we served poorly in the third set and it felt like every other phase of the game was dead even. If you eliminate serving pressure from the game, they might have been the better team. We were better than them in one phase. Now, it was a lot better and it was a really good phase for us, which is why it tipped the scales. Every other thing I look at, they were as good or better than us. What happens if our serving isn't good? We would have lost that game. You can't rely on one phase to win in the playoffs. That's what we did tonight and that's really frustrating. We have to find more ways to play the game well than just leaning into one phase and praying it's enough. We'll take the win in a tournament format and move on, but that is not good enough and it's not going to be close to good enough on Sunday and it definitely won't be good enough if we move forward in this tournament.

"We served tough. We didn't serve in. So that's like we improved halfway from last week. We have to find some more consistent pressure and if we don't, we're going to be in deep trouble in this tournament."

Saskatchewan Head Coach Sean McKay
"We were going to have to serve a big game and we really dropped the ball on that one. We had way too many errors and didn't make them sideout. We were going after it, but not successfully. That part of our game was really lacking and we rely on that a lot, especially against good volleyball teams.

"Tomorrow is a totally different team, but all the teams are really good at this stage in the season. The more times we can play good volleyball teams, the more we can learn - whether that be a different offensive look or maybe some more physical guys. We need to look at the things we did do well today and apply them against Calgary.

"We've never seen a six spinner lineup like we did tonight. We've seen serves that hard but not that relentless, so I think we faltered a bit there. From a middle matchup perspective, we had a tough time managing Schnitzer and Howe."

NOTABLE
The Huskies are now 2-2 in the playoffs, after finishing second in their Week 1 pool with a 2-1 record.
The Spartans have now won seven straight matches against the Huskies.
The last time TWU played Saskatchewan in the playoffs was Mar. 5, 2016 when the Spartans beat the Huskies in four sets to capture the Canada West championship.

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