Gaels can’t stop Brock

Women’s volleyball wins first two sets but couldn’t win third in loss

It was déjà vu for the women’s volleyball team on Saturday as they lost a close, five-set match to the Brock Badgers. The team won the first two sets but fell in the following three, a repeat of their previous match against Ottawa the weekend before.

Head coach Joely Christian said her team’s performance showed promise but was plagued with confidence issues produced by the Ottawa loss.

“Once again we showed that we are capable of playing with some of the best teams in the OUA,” she said. “There was a lot of fear from what happened the week before that kept us from executing that match.” The beginning of the Gaels’ season matched them up with two of the OUA’s powerhouse teams. Ottawa currently sits first in the OUA East and Brock first in the OUA West.

With the Gaels on the road to Toronto this weekend for a Halloween match against the University of Toronto Varsity Blues and a Saturday match against the Ryerson Rams, Christian said the focus during the week was on closing.

“[We’re] preparing them to play from start to finish,” she said. “The key word here is finish.”

Middle hitter Christiane Taylor, who led the team with 16 kills and an impressive .590 kill percentage, said the game was both impressive and disappointing.

“We know we can beat any team,” she said. “We wanted to prove that we can do it and we can finish games.”

She said the team’s strength is in the bench.

“We have a very deep team,” she said. “We have a lot of players that can step on the court and make a difference.”

The weekend’s loss drops the women to 0-2 on the season.Taylor said the team needs more court time to harness their individual skills into a unit.

“Right now we’re not playing as a team,” she said. “It will come down to more experience from some people.”

Taylor said the early losses aren’t necessarily indicative of the season to come.

“We’re still trying to figure a bunch of things out.”

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