SAINT JOHN, N.B. - This second day of the CCAA Women’s National Volleyball Championship started with the two losing teams for yesterday’s afternoon matches, the Humber Hawks and Mt. Allison Mounties. With a berth in the bronze medal game still a possibility for today’s winner, both teams gave it their all on the court.

A few powerful serves from the Hawks set the tone right off the bat in the first set, and catapulted them to a 5-1 lead. The Mounties then took advantage of many attacking errors from the Hawks to get back into the set, but the powerful Ontarians made life difficult for the Mountie defence, especially CCAA national player of the year Landis Doyle.

Two consecutive communication errors forced Mounties head coach Andrew Kennedy to take his first timeout at 15-8. An injury to starting setter Allison Settle at 19-11 signalled Brittany Cain’s entry into the game, but this did not change Humber’s game plan one bit, and they took the first set convincingly by a score of 25-12. T

Good news for the Mounties in the second set, as setter Allison Settle made her return to the court. Nevertheless, Landis Doyle started right where she left off in the first set, crushing numerous balls deep into Mountie court and handing her Hawks a 7-1 lead.

Poor service reception was once again the Mounties’ downfall in this set. Kennedy called his second timeout of the set at 16-7, which seemed to rally his troops for a little while. The Mounties were never able to completely comeback, and lost the set 25-14.

A few serving errors from the Hawks at the start of the third set allowed the Mounties to match them point-for-point until it reached 7-7. From this point, Lindsay Ballance took over the match from the service line, and pushed the Hawks lead to 14-8. To the delight of the fans in the crowd, the Mounties were able to mount a comeback, but the once again fell short, falling 25-13 in the ultimate set.

The Hawks now move on to play the losing team from the VIU/UBCO match, while the Mounties will play in the 7th place game against the losers of UNBSJ/Grande Prairie.

Player of the match the Hawks is Kelly Nyhof, author of 3 blocks and a hitting percentage of 100%. For the Mounties, that honour goes to Caitlin MacDonald, with 8 digs and 4 kills.

Official tournament website, and watch games live at: www.ccaawomensvolleyball2011.ca

Source: University of New Brunswick Saint John