MONTREAL --
Claire Vercheval of St. Julie, Que., scored a game-high 20.5 points as No.5 ranked McGill blanked UQAM 3-0, Friday, to open the RSEQ best-of-three women's volleyball semifinals at Love Competition Hall. The set scores were 25-19, 25-22 and 25-14.
The Martlets, who have now taken five of seven meetings against the Citadins including preseason, will play Game 2 of the series at the Centre Sportive UQAM on Feb. 23 at 1 p.m. The winner of the series will advance to the league finals against either Laval or Montreal, in addition to punching their ticket to Nationals.
McGill had a 43-31 edge in kills and a 10-5 advantage in service aces against the Citadins, who registered a 45-42 margin in digs.
"We played like I expect the team to play, we followed the game plan very well. We got out of it a bit in the second set but we came back and applied what we needed to do," said Martlet bench boss
Rachele Beliveau, named the day before as the conference's coach of the year. "I'm expecting them to make some changes next game, we need to be ready to adjust."
Vercheval, a 6-foot-1 power-hitter who received pre-game laureates as player of the year in the RSEQ conference, earned her points on the strength of 17 kills, three aces and an assisted block. She also added seven digs on defence and posted a team-leading 2.33 passing ratio (out of 3) on six balls.
Montrealer
Emilie Matte De Grasse, a fifth-year physical education senior, tallied 12 kills, one service ace, and three assisted blocks. The 5-foot-10 all-conference power-hitter also added nine digs.
Charlene Robitaille, a second-team all-star and nutritional science freshman from St. Jean, Que., contributed 12 points.
"We served very well, we had 10 aces and were able to unstabilize their defence, which is important because they are a very strong defensive team," noted Beliveau. "They have a different style of offence, they are smaller, will play off timing balls and they'll try to play the wipe-off a lot. We need to be patient but they play very hard so we have to stay on top of them at all times."
The Citadins were led by
Frédérique Nicole with 9.5 points followed by
Josiane Aubuchon (8 pts) and
Gabrielle Archambault (7 pts).
"We have to show up (for Game 2 on Saturday) and we have to be ready because UQAM's season is on the line and we know they are not going to make it easy for us."
The two teams return to the court on Saturday for Game 2 of the RSEQ semi-final series, with a 1 p.m. start at the Centre Sportif. If Game 3 is necessary it will be played at 2 p.m. Sunday (Feb 24) in Love Competition Hall.
In the other RSEQ semifinal series, the second-seeded Montreal Carabin's won their opener 3-1 over third-seeded Laval.
2018-19 RSEQ Women's Volleyball Standings (FINAL)
| 1 |
McGill |
20 |
17 |
3 |
53 |
22 |
1765 |
1540 |
0.850 |
0.0 |
34 |
| 2 |
Montréal |
20 |
13 |
7 |
45 |
31 |
1697 |
1617 |
0.650 |
4.0 |
26 |
| 3 |
Laval |
20 |
12 |
8 |
42 |
33 |
1673 |
1677 |
0.600 |
5.0 |
24 |
| 4 |
UQAM |
20 |
10 |
10 |
40 |
39 |
1764 |
1678 |
0.500 |
7.0 |
20 |
| 5 |
Sherbrooke |
20 |
7 |
13 |
36 |
45 |
1731 |
1786 |
0.350 |
10.0 |
14 |
| 6 |
Ottawa |
20 |
1 |
19 |
13 |
59 |
1421 |
1753 |
0.050 |
16.0 |
2 |
