SHERIDAN 3, ST. CLAIR 1 (FINAL)

OAKVILLE, Ont. - Though they struggled with consistency throughout, when the match was their for the taking the Sheridan Bruins women's volleyball team (13-12-1, 5-5 OCAA) showed the resolve necessary to beat St. Clair 3-1 and get back to level in the OCAA West standings.

"The thing that really impressed me was our mental toughness at the end," head coach Patrick Krychowski said. "Being down we had to serve four straight balls to win that last set and close out the match and we did a great job. We just transitioned every ball, got it back up and put it on the floor. That was the good part of the match - there were some really good spots. Mental toughness is what we've been working on and it came through at the end for us."

After dropping the first set 25-19, the Lady Bruins bounced back to claim the second in rather convincing fashion 25-13.

It looked like they might run away from St. Clair, jumping out to an 8-4 lead in the third but quickly saw their opponents square the set.

They fell behind by as many as five - 16-11 - but rallied to tie at 19 apiece and executed better when they needed it most to win 25-23.

It was a similar story in the four set, as the double-blue jumped out to leads of 8-1 and 13-6, but St. Clair was the one to rally this time pulling ahead of the home side 19-16.

At this point Sheridan's work from the service line helped to turn the tide as Hannah Hubicki, Melissa Cappelletti and Jessica Turalinski all dealt a few aces and Kaitlin Gagnon and had some quality moments as well to close out the match 26-24.

Hubicki had match-high totals in points with 18 (12 kills, five aces, one block) and digs (15), while Cappelletti notched 13 points (nine kills, three aces, one block) and Ashley Emran had 13 digs.

The club will go back on the road to face Conestoga on January 18 and while Krychowski believes some wandering eyes may be responsible for some of the inconsistencies, he's looking forward to seeing how his team responds.

"We might have been thinking a little bit ahead to the next couple of weeks, but we just need to bear down," he said. "Conestoga has been playing really, really well and we need to go into their gym next Wednesday and play more consistently. I think we stabilized our setting a little bit - it was a tad off. We'll do a better job all around, but a scare isn't a bad thing as long as we learned from it and we know we need to be a little more consistent."

Blue notes: Cappelletti has now posted double-digit point totals in seven straight OCAA West  contests. The Lady Bruins have seen a marked increase in their production from the service line this year, as their 12 aces marked the fifth time they have topped double-digits in team aces. They now have 96 on the season to average 9.6 per match. In the previous five seasons the team has averaged 5.2, 5.8, 4.9, 5.9 and 7.2 aces per match. Cappelletti posted the highest individual total in the same span last year with 31, but already has 29 this year.

Source: Sheridan I.T.