UBC earns win over Alberta to claim Canada West bronze, punch ticket to nationals

VANCOUVER – Just 24 hours after a straight sets loss to the Manitoba Bisons in the Canada West Semifinals, the UBC Thunderbirds came back out on the court at War Memorial Gym and delivered a win in straight sets over the Alberta Golden Bears (25-22, 25-19, 25-17).

With the victory, the T-Birds won Canada West bronze for the second time in the last three seasons, and secured their place at next week's U SPORTS Men's Volleyball Championship.

"I kept saying to them all day that it was going to be our mindset and our character that was going to persevere and get us through here," said UBC head coach Mike Hawkins. "X's and o's were only going to mean so much in a game like this, we needed to bounce back after a disappointing loss and even I couldn't have expected the performance that our guys to put in. It ended up being clean but in all three sets we ended up being down, down big in the second set as well but just time after time they flexed their character and mentality that they were going to get the job done."

Reeve Gingera was electric for UBC, as he recorded a season-high 18 kills with just a single attack error, good for a stunning .630 hitting percentage. Alex Borowski provided eight kills and five digs in support, while Mason Greves recorded 33 assists, five digs and two kills.

Dylan Martens led the way for Alberta offensively with 12 kills, earning the Mikasa Player of the Game award alongside Gingera. Jacob Sargent put up eight kills and four digs while middle blockers Trent Cherewaty and Owen Harris combined for 13 kills.

It was nearly impossible to separate the two teams in the opening set, with neither leading by more than two points until the closing stages. Down 20-19 following a Martens kill, the Thunderbirds proceeded to rally by scoring four straight points, capped by a block from Kieran Robinson-Dunning and Dawson Pratt.

A couple more late errors from the Golden Bears ended the set just a few plays later, with the T-Birds escaping with the crucial early lead.

It looked like Alberta would hit right back in the second, as following a series of UBC errors they found themselves up 12-5. But coming out of a timeout, all of a sudden, a switch seemed to flip inside the Thunderbirds. Less than a dozen points later they'd taken the lead, and didn't let up the rest of the set as they outscored Alberta 20-7 from that timeout onwards.

By the time Borowski ended the second with a kill, momentum was squarely on the T-Birds' side of the court, and that continued in the third. While the Golden Bears battled hard – with Sargent especially coming alive as he landed five kills in the frame – UBC was in a groove as they tallied 13 kills without a single attack error as a team in the third.

After Gingera set up match point with his fifth kill of the final set, a Nicholas Johnson serve was mishandled and sent back over to the UBC side of the net, where Alex Emery was only too happy to oblige with a final kill to complete the win.

"We've had a really special season and I don't think we can take that for granted," added Hawkins in reflecting upon Friday's semifinal loss vs Manitoba. "But sometimes you need a little punch in the mouth to test the jam of the team and judging by this response I think we proved to ourselves that even in the face of adversity we can rise."

The result means that the Thunderbirds will head to nationals for the second time under Hawkins, and with much of the same core of players aiming to do one or two better than the U SPORTS bronze medal that they earned in the 2023-24 season.

"The celebration was warranted this group deserves to be at the U SPORTS Championship, they deserve to be in Windsor next week," concluded Hawkins. "This isn't just one year where we've been special with this record. This has been three, four, five years with this group of special young men, I would have rather been in the gold medal match rather than Canada West three but if we play like we did tonight I'm very confident in what we can accomplish the rest of the way."

The 2026 U SPORTS Men's Volleyball Championship will be held from March 13 to 15, hosted by the University of Windsor.