news photo sean rooney - Members of the Briercrest Clippers celebrate their semifinal win over King's at ACAC women's volleyball championships Friday in Medicine Hat.
It’ll be an all-South final at the Alberta Colleges Athletic Conference women’s volleyball championships Saturday, but the home team’s season has come to an end.
The Briercrest Clippers and Red Deer Queens each swept their respective semifinals Friday night at the Snake Pit in Medicine Hat College, advancing to the final and also earning spots at nationals in Quebec.
“We were really in that fearless mindset, it was fun to be part of that today,” said Clippers middle Mikayla Benterud. “We surrendered the outcome, we’d prepared a lot for this match.”
The second-year Sherwood Park product had three key aces to go with eight kills and five digs in a surprisingly one-sided 3-0 (25-23, 25-18, 25-19) win over The King’s University. The rematch of last year’s ACAC final was a loud one thanks to Briercrest’s fans who came ready with horns, homemade percussion and a ton of energy, all put to good use as their team will return to the Canadian championships.
But first, they’ll face Red Deer, which earned the only technical upset of the day in a 3-0 (25-22, 25-21, 25-22) win over North Division top seed Augustana. The Queens haven’t been to nationals since winning back-to-back CCAA titles in 2014 and 2015.
“Getting out of our conference is really hard every year,” said Briercrest coach Nolan Weinmaster. “We have absolute belief that we can take on any challenge, but no expectations.”
Earlier in the day, Ambrose swept NAIT 3-0 by identical 26-24 scores, and Lakeland came from two sets down to beat the host Rattlers 3-2 (19-25, 22-25, 25-19, 25-22, 15-8).
Briercrest, with its entire starting lineup back after winning silver at the conference level last year, was led by its trio of fifth-years: Becky Garner’s 16 kills, libero Kirsty Kindrachuck’s 15 digs and setter (and league MVP) Ashley Erickson’s 43 assists were telling, but so too was the fact six Clippers registered at least three kills.
“They’re just such a good, consistent team, they don’t make many errors,” said King’s coach Grace Scott, who had roughly half her roster back after winning the ACAC last year and taking second at nationals. “They’re a very difficult team to get more than one point, two points (in a row) on.”
The Eagles got 13 kills and seven digs from Anna Pattison, but they simply couldn’t match what was coming at them from the other side of the net.
Red Deer, one of two teams to beat Briercrest all season, used a voracious defence led by Emma Holmes (14 kills, nine digs, four blocks) to stymie Augustana. Tess Pearman added 12 kills, Kaylee Domoney 17 digs and the Queens earned their spot in the 6 p.m. final game.
Rae Metrunec had 12 kills and three aces for the Vikings, who will play King’s in a third-place game at 3 p.m.
As for the host team, it looked for a while like they’d get the uplifting moment they dreamed of. Up two sets and 8-4 in the third, Medicine Hat was writing a pretty good fairytale moment for its trio of outgoing seniors, Amber Stigter, Shaya Suchy and Janesse Oelke.
Then the Rustlers got going.
“You could see right at the beginning, my players didn’t want to play today,” said Lakeland coach Austin Dyer. “Within the game we had a couple conversations, like ‘you guys are walking around like your dog died… how do you want the season to end and how do you want to go out?'”
Once the Lloydminster side got to a 13-13 tie, it was all downhill from there.
“We had the goal of leaving it all on the floor out there,” said Hat coach Kim Stonehouse. “But how can you be mad at a team that just played with their heart out there? You can’t ask for any more.”
There are still plenty of positives to take from the performance if you’re a Rattlers fan, however. The program hadn’t been to playoffs since 2013 and has plenty of returning talent. Brooke Christie had 15 kills and 18 digs, Stigter had 14 kills and 18 digs, Suchy had 22 digs and Megan Hoeber had 10 kills, eight digs and five blocks from the middle position.
“It was hard to see their tears at the end, but it was our last game, the emotions were definitely high,” said Dryden Gris. “We can beat any team that comes to us. If we work as hard as we did these two games in provincials, it’s no doubt we can compete with every team.”
Jenay Varga led Lakeland with 21 kills while Madison Blain had 15 kills and 17 digs. The Rustlers play Ambrose in a 1 p.m. consolation final.
