Mount Royal spoils Brandon’s home opener

The Brandon University Bobcats showed they can compete in stretches on Friday.

If those stretches were just a little longer, the scoreline would have looked a lot different. But their failure to close cost them in a 3-0 (25-22, 26-24, 25-17) loss to the Mount Royal Cougars (1-2) in their Canada West women’s volleyball home opener at the Healthy Living Centre on Friday.

“Aggression was key here. Serving at the right targets and being aggressive at the net as well with hitting, knowing we can put the ball down when we want, I think that was the key thing in why we were taking the lead,” said opposite Cassidy Hauta, who led BU with eight kills.

“They came back firing hard balls right back at us. That’s something they did really well and kept us on our toes.”

Steph Miller got the Bobcats (0-3) off to a good start with strong service pressure for the first few points, while Brooklyn Pratt was targeted often but passed well to give BU an early 6-3 lead.

It wasn’t quite the start Mount Royal needed as Bronwyn Davies-Neira piled up three quick hitting errors and Brandon pulled ahead 12-7.

But the Cougars cleaned it up and came alive offensively on the back of Sydney Scatcherd, who scored at will from the front and back row to take their first lead at 16-15.

Brandon retook the lead but not by more than one, as the teams traded points all the way to 22-22.

From there, the Mount Royal block defence took over with two stuffs before a BU error to close out the set.

The second set was all Carly Thomson and Hauta early. The fifth-year setter fed the opposite for three early kills while adding a crafty dump and a block as BU opened up a 9-4 advantage.

The Bobcats gave it all back on a 6-1 run, though, as Scatcherd started overpowering the hosts’ block.

Again, the set was neck and neck up to 20-20, when Eva Dooks subbed in to serve for Brandon. The backup libero provided the defensive boost the Bobcats needed to string a few long rallies together and pull ahead 23-20.

But just like the first set, the Cougars blocked the lights out late to claw back before Hauta attacked a ball long to put the visitors up 2-0 in the match.

MRU entered the third set with extra confidence and led almost wire-to-wire as setter Kennedy Williscroft fed her outside hitters to blast the ball past the smaller BU blocks.

The Cougars led 17-9 before the Bobcats gave a last-ditch effort to make it close, but ultimately couldn’t win their first set of the season.

They’ll try to do so in today’s rematch at 5 p.m.

“We were super, super excited to come out here (Friday), so I think our energy was so good, it was so fun to be in front of our home crowd again and I think we were super fiery, so we felt pretty good about that,” Hauta said.

“We’re right there with them, so I think (tonight) we can get it.”

Brandon had 32 kills and 21 errors while Mount Royal recorded 35 and 18. The Cougars put up 11 blocks to the Bobcats’ five.

Dyer was Brandon’s most efficient hitter, with six kills and two errors for a .267 hitting percentage. The Barbados native added three blocks and an ace.

“Nerissa’s awesome. We really, really value her on our team. She can come out and just bounce a ball right in front of the person. We really love when she’s firing it up,” Hauta said.

“She’s the type of person that doesn’t like to cheer for herself, so we make sure to cheer for her just as much. We hope she can continue doing all that stuff for our team.”

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