By Larry Read

TRU Sports Information Officer 

KAMLOOPS, BC—The Thompson Rivers University WolfPack women's volleyball team is back to the .500 mark with two weeks to go in the Canada West regular season.

The Pack swept the visiting Brandon University Bobcats in two straight matches. On Saturday (Feb 2), it was a straight set victory. The scores were  25-23,25-21,26-24.

TRU moves to 10-10 on the season while Brandon moves to 4-18.

 SYNOPSIS

The teams battled throughout the match. In the first set, TRU was up by as much as four points.  Kendra Finch (4^th year, outside hitter, North Vancouver, BC) was named the TRU Bookstore/McDonalds "Leader of the Pack" player of the match and had 5 kills in TRU's first 11 points in the first set.

Finch had a game high 15 kills. 

Nikala Majewski ( 5^th year, left side, Winnipeg, MB)  led the Brandon offense with 13 kills in 45 swings.

The match was the final regular season one for the Pack on the championship court at the Tournament Capital Centre.

VIDEO HIGHLIGHTS: 

click here

THEY SAID IT (post match quotes):

TRU head coach Chad Grimm:

On the sweep: "Obviously the sweep is nice. To finish it off in three was also nice. We let one slip into five yesterday when we had a lead late in the third. Today, we had a lead in the third and this time we were tough mentally and not let that effect us.

On learning taking place going into post season: " This is a young team. These are playoff type games in the sense that you have to perform and get results in order to be in the playoffs. We know that. But we also know we need to play well and we need to worry about our own abilities and do our jobs and play it a point at a time or we wont be there. For the new girls, getting that experience of playing games that are meaningful that you want a result because the end is near but at the same time play one point at a time."

COACHES POST GAME VIDEO INTERVIEW:   click here

Brandon coach Lee Carter (13^th  season):

On match:  "Lot like yesterday. The teams are pretty evenly matched. The games are really close and Thompson Rivers just found a way to finish at the end. Olga finds a way to score when they need to score. We have a young team. They are trying. We got a lot of players in to play in a lot of different situations. They are learning and that is what you want with a young team. We just keep building. That is what the season is about."

COACHES POST GAME VIDEO INTERVIEW:  click here

UP NEXT:

The WolfPack close out the home portion of their 2018-19 Canada West season next weekend (Feb 8-9) against the University of Saskatchewan Huskies.  The two matches will be played at the old TRU gym because of a scheduling conflict at the TCC.   Friday night is "Retro night" where championship teams from the Cariboo College/University College of the Cariboo era's will be honored.

The weekend also marks the return of former TRU assistant coach Nathan Bennett to Kamloops and the school.  Bennett left this summer to pursue his lifelong dream to coach a Canada West volleyball program.  He is now guiding the Saskatchewan men's program.

The Bobcats are idle next weekend and don't play until February 15^th when they close out the Canada West season hosting the MacEwan University Griffins.

Those matches will be webcast on www.Canadawesttv beginning with the pregame show at 4:50 pm .