Manuel, Heat knock off Bobcats in four sets

Scott Koskie watched the Brandon University Bobcats win nationals on home court and couldn’t wait to take his team there.

The Winnipeg native in his second season as head coach of the UBC Okanagan Heat men’s volleyball team circled this weekend on his calendar as soon as the schedule came out.

On Friday night, they delivered a terrific effort to beat the Bobcats 3-1 (25-22, 25-23, 19-25, 25-19) at the Healthy Living Centre.

“This is a great place to play, great fans, these guys put on a great performance last year and they always play tough at home. It feels great to come in and beat a good team at home,” Koskie said.

“We were probably a little bit fortunate in the first set but sometimes the ball bounces your way.”

Brandon (3-6) was loving life early, up 22-17 with kills by all but one of its attackers.

But it all came unravelled on one Xander van Driel serving run as the heavy-hitting outside hitter bombed away to force a few out-of-system balls.

The Heat (10-1) blocked Liam Pauls twice and fed Seba Manuel for five kills before van Driel ripped a back-row attack to cap a devastating 8-0 run and win the set.

Manuel scored seven times on nine attempts, matching the entire BU lineup while UBCO had 18 kills in the frame.

“We look at it a little bit differently because we don’t have the service pressure that Brandon does. We’re not able to crank it up so we look at our make rate,” Koskie said. “We worked a lot this year on block defence. For us, the biggest thing is a deficit like that … we can’t make it up all at once but it has to start with getting serves in the court.”

Brandon was up 17-14 in the second, but once again made a few errors and gave it back. UBCO made it 21-18 with a heavy dose of Manuel from the back row.

The Bobcats made two untimely errors down the stretch, and while Pauls and Ethan Baraniuk scored late to keep it close, Manuel finished it off after a Scott Koskie timeout.

Friesen lifted the Bobcats to a comfortable 18-13 lead in the third, hammering a kill to send himself back to the service line and then tacking on two aces.

The Bobcats stayed up at least three the rest of the frame, as Aden Sinoski came off the bench and served them up to set point before Riley Brunet scored after a perfect pass to make the set score 2-1.

The fourth set was tight up to 15-14, but untimely errors by Brunet and Friesen helped the Heat get in front, and another big run on van Driel’s serve put them ahead 22-16.

Van Driel scored his 19th kill of the night on a back-row ball to bring up match point, then, after Pauls scored twice to keep it alive, Manuel ripped his match-high 20th to end it.

Manuel only made two hitting errors while Friesen (16 kills) and Pauls (14 kills) made four each.

“The level that (Seba) has taken his game to is exceptional,” Koskie said. “Oftentimes, the team that has the best outside hitter wins, maybe not the best outside hitter overall but the best outside hitter on that night.

“We knew Liam and Thomas can deliver and they’ve proven that, and we knew we had to have someone on our side.

“Seba’s really grown into that role this year … he’s ready to be a leader on our team and in Year 4, it’s time to step up to be one of the best guys in the league, and I think he’s shown that.”

The teams play again today at 6:45 p.m.

BU BASKETBALL: The Bobcats men’s basketball team took a setback on Friday, falling 102-99 in overtime to the last-place Saskatchewan Huskies (2-7).

Arjun Hehar led BU (5-6) with 32 points while Sultan Bhatti netted 28.

Easton Thimm led the Huskies with 25. The teams play again today at 7 p.m.

» tfriesen@brandonsun.com

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