The Briercrest College Clippers are off to the gold medal final in the Alberta Colleges Athletic Conference women’s volleyball championship.
Their journey to the title game was anything but easy on Friday night, though, as they found themselves in a battle with Lakeland College in the semifinal, eventually prevailing 3-2 (26-28, 26-24, 17-25, 25-23, 15-9) over the North Division’s second place regular season team.
Both teams finished with 20-4 records, with the Clippers entering the playoffs as the top seed out of the South Division.
As she has much of the season Becky Garner led the Briercrest attack, pouring down 29 kills while also getting the job done defensively with 11 digs. Clippers libero Kirsty Kindrachuk picked 25 digs to go along with 15 from Mia Harder, 14 from Ashley Erickson and 12 from Reece Harder, who also contributed 11 kills.
Briercrest College’s opponents in the gold medal game will be exactly who they expected – North Division regular season champion The King’s University, who carried a 22-2 record and five game winning streak into the postseason. That match takes place later tonight in Calgary.
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Moose Jaw’s Dax Whitehead and the Lethbridge College Kodiaks will be playing in the game they hoped to be playing in on Saturday night – but like the Clippers, it was as close as could be.
The Kodiaks – 22-2 in the regular season and the top seeds in the South Division – needed five games to take a 3-2 (25-19, 25-20, 23-25, 24-26, 15-6) in the semifinal Friday.
After a quiet night in Lethbridge’s quarter-final match-up, Whitehead was back in his CCAA all-time kills leader form against the Trojans, putting down 13 kills while adding 10 digs.
Whitehead and his teammates go for gold when they take on the top seed from the North, Keyano College tonight.
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The Clippers men’s hockey team dropped a 5-1 decision to the SAIT Trojans at Barkman Arena in Caronport on Friday night.
Halen Cordoni scored Briercrest’s lone goal at the 11:37 mark of the third period, with Jake Gushue drawing the lone assist. SAIT led 1-0 after the first and 3-0 through two.
Dan Deckoning turned aside 51 shots for the Clippers, who fell to 5-19-1-0 on the season and remain three points back of Concordia for the final playoff spot.
Briercrest returns to action for a rematch with SAIT Saturday afternoon. They close out the regular season on the Mar. 1 weekend with a pair of home games against Red Deer College.
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A tough season didn’t get any easier for the Clippers men’s basketball team as they fell 93-79 to Red Deer College.
Nicholas Gregerson scored 35 points to lead Briercrest, who dropped to 2-18 on the season. Red Deer improved to 12-8. C.J. Greer added 23 points and 10 rebounds.
The two teams were back in action Saturday at the Margaret P. Reimer gym.
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The Clippers women’s basketball squad picked up a measure of revenge after having their promising playoff push come to an end last weekend, as they took a 75-71 win over Red Deer.
Briercrest’s balanced offence was on display in the contest, with Tracy Lewis scoring 16 points, Adrianna Beck and Hope Jordens 12 each and Amber Tilcox 11.
The Clippers led 40-38 at the half and 64-48 through three quarters.
Briercrest improved to 10-10 on the season, the Queens fell to 3-17.
Game two of the weekend set is this afternoon.
