Briercrest came out against Medicine Hat eager for a repeat of last night’s sweep and succeeded, shutting them out 3-0 (27-25, 25-12, 25-13).

Briercrest enjoyed a short lead in the first set until Medicine Hat caught up, 4-4. Elly Wendel’s serving sparked temporary momentum for Briercrest, pulling ahead 9-4. The score remained tight the rest of the set, evening out at 11-11, 14-14, 20-20 and 24-24. After rallying back and forth, Briercrest received a boost to win the first set 27-25.

Briercrest captain Brooke Peterson said serving was key to their victory.

She explained, “The first set was definitely so close because we weren’t serving as aggressive and we were missing a lot of serves,” adding that serving was the difference between the first and third set scores.

Briercrest earned five uninterrupted points with solid attacks by Starlet Peterson and Whitney Zylstra in the second set before Medicine Hat pushed back 7-4.  Serving losses were cause of an exchange of points, Medicine Hat getting as close as 9-7 before Briercrest sped away, overwhelming Medicine Hat 25-12. Brooke Peterson made an incredible out of bounds save for Briercrest’s final point.

Briercrest claimed nine unanswered points in the third set before Medicine Hat was able to answer back.

Peterson commented, “we just got a lot of momentum with our serving and they couldn’t keep up passing so we were happy with the outcome.”

With a vast lead, Briercrest was able to settle in and play their game.

“I was mostly impressed that we didn’t relax too much—to the point where we started making errors and let them come back,” Peterson continued, “It’s always a really big struggle to keep the balance between relaxed and aggressive,” concluding that maintaining consistency in that is something the team is still figuring out.

Ahead 17-5, rookies Abbi Robinson and Deanna Wall came in and closed out the game, 25-13.

Players of the game were Medicine Hat’s Cari Munro with a team high four kills, three digs and one block, and Briercrest’s Mikayla Reinhardt with seven kills, five aces and four digs.

Elly Wendel led with a game high nine kills and a game high six aces. Brooke Peterson had a game high 14 digs.
Briercrest dominated with 35 kills compared to Medicine Hat’s 16. Briercrest nailed 16 aces and Medicine Hat had 5. Briercrest had 46 blocks while Medicine Hat had 34.

Briercrest travels to Calgary to take on the SAIT Trojans, November 8 at 6:00pm and November 9 at 1:00pm.

Games will be streamed online at Sportscanada.tv, and the Briercrest Volleyball facebook page.