Trojans fall in 5 to Rattlers

CALGARY, ALTA., (Nov. 2, 2019) - SAIT Trojans women's volleyball coach Art O'Dwyer is quick to remind that the season is a marathon, not a sprint.

His Trojans fell to the Medicine Hat College Rattlers 3-2 (22-25, 25-21, 18-25, 25-17, 17-15) in their Saturday night Alberta Colleges Athletic Conference (ACAC) contest played inside SAIT's Campus Centre.

"Progress. I saw some progress today," he said after the game. "It wasn't the result we wanted, but it was a better battle by us. We'll take that as a positive."

SAIT falls to 2-5 on the season, while Medicine Hat improves to 2-4.

Much like Friday's 3-1 loss, SAIT found themselves up 1-0 after the first set. But, the Rattlers were able to come back and tie it in the second set.

The teams traded wins in Sets 3 and 4 before sending the game to a fifth and final set.

In that race to 15 points, the Rattlers got out to an early 6-2 lead. After switching sides down 8-4, O'Dwyer called a timeout that sparked his team.

They were able to come back and tie the match at 13-13, and then take the lead 14-13, but could not close out the match. Medicine Hat, on the other hand, found a way to tie it up and then close out the match 17-15.

"The positive is that we didn't make errors for it to end, they had to play," O'Dwyer stated. "Could we have been more aggressive, maybe hindsight says yes."

Jadyn Leong (3rd year, Calgary, Business Administration) had a big game for the Trojans, recording 23 kills and seven digs.

Amber Stigter led the Rattlers with 13 kills.

The Trojans return to action next week with a pair of road games against Ambrose University - Thursday night at 6pm, and Friday night at 6pm.