Kodiaks women’s volleyball team battles through adversity for win

By Dale Woodard - Lethbridge Herald on January 29, 2022.

Herald photo by Dale Woodard Lethbridge College Kodiaks Jamie Brown (20) and Claire Armstrong (7) go up for the block against Ambrose Lion Bethany Johnson in Alberta Colleges Athletic Conference play Friday night at the Val Matteotti Gymnasium.

The Lethbridge College Kodiaks women’s volleyball team battled not only the Ambrose Lions, but a little adversity as well.
Fortunately, they won both battles following a 3-1 victory over the Lions in Alberta Colleges Athletic Conference play Friday night at the Val Matteotti Gymnasium.
However, the win – which improves the Kodiaks to 6-2 – came with a price as starting left side and veteran Mack Lewicki exited the game halfway through the second set with a hand injury.
“She dove for a ball and caught her hand under the scorekeeping table,” said Kodiaks head coach Anna Schwark. “So she has a big gash right on her knuckle. So she went to the hospital to get a couple of stitches. We’ll see how long she’s out. It wasn’t a big cut, per se, the stitches will be pretty straight forward. We’ll just be waiting to see until she’s pain free.
“It was pretty traumatic, so that’s why I’m so thankful we channelled the fear and frustration off that.”
The Lions won that second set to tie it at 1-1 after the Kodiaks won the first set 25-23, but Lethbridge rallied back in the third and fourth sets with 25-20 and 25-17 wins, respectively, to post the win.
“I will say the team did a lot better job handling their frustrations than I did,” said Schwark. “I know I was feeling the same emotions they were and I don’t know if I would have been able to channel that stay motivated after losing our left side and one of our captains and being a bit frustrated with some calls. But overall I’m really happy this is the outcome.”
The win comes after the Kodiaks games the previous weekend in Caronport, Sask. against the Briercrest Clippers were postponed when the Clippers COVID-19 concerns.
“We really wanted to be playing two weeks ago,” said Schwark. “We’ve just being itching to go and we knew Briercrest would be a good match. But this was a very good match, they made us work very hard.”
Kodiak Johanna Dixon put up 15 digs and three kills in the winning cause.
But the setter said it was tough watching their captain go down to injury.
“I thought in the second set we kind of lost our confidence,” said Dixon.
“In the third set we said ‘Let’s cut it out. Let’s get it back,’ and we all started working as a team, trusting one another and that’s when our shots, defence and passing were more affective.”

Jamie Brown led the Kodiaks with 13 kills 11 digs and two blocked shots. Reia Taylor and Eryka Woods added 11 kills each.
Elyse Doble chipped in with 11 digs and Aideena Wickstrom put up three blocked shots.
Having to cool their heels last weekend when their games at Briercrest were postponed forced the team to get back on track over the past week in preparation for Ambrose.
“I think not being able to play kind of took our heads out of the game a little bit,” said Schwark. “Practices weren’t really up to par of what we would expect. Monday and Tuesday weren’t that great, but luckily we had a fantastic Thursday night practice, probably one of the best we’ve had. So we definitely made up for it. But you could tell in impacted our play and we weren’t really the same team we usually are.”
The Kodiaks now go for the sweep tonight in Calgary. Game time is 6 p.m.
“It’s going to be even tough in Ambrose’s gym because it always is,” said Schwark. “It’s a gym we have a lot of trouble serving in. So that’s going to be a big thing, making sure we’re staying aggressive and confident on our serves. They won’t have fans there, so that will be maybe little bit of help for us. It is a closed space with the fans. So not having that I think will allow to us to just focus on our ball and make sure we’re doing what we need to do.
“But I think Ambrose is going to come and play just as clean. They didn’t make a ton of errors for most of that match and they’re probably going to be more comfortable at home. So hopefully we handle that OK.”
“I think their game plan is going to stay pretty much the same, maybe they’re going to try some new things on us, added Dixon. “But I definitely think our game plan is going to stay the same. We’re going to play the way we played (Friday) and hopefully it’ll be a win for us again.”‘
The Kodiaks and Lions men’s team were playing in the late game Friday night.
A score was unavailable at press time.
On the basketball court, the Kodiaks were in Calgary to take on the Lions.
In the women’s game, the Kodiaks won their eighth straight with an 81-7y victory that improves them to 9-1 as Courtney Deemter drained 33 points eight steals and seven assists.
Montana Berezay and Kirsten Barwegen chipped in with 24 and 11 points, respectively. Barwegen also had 10 rebounds for the double double.
Matlin Jacobs had six assists and five steals.
The Kodiaks shot 37.8 per cent from the field, 34.4 per cent on three-pointers and 77.8 per cent from the foul line.
In the men’s game ()É
The basketball teams are back at the Val Matteotti Gymnasium tonight in the rematch with the Lions.
The women’s game is at 6 p.m. with the men to follow at 8 p.m.
Tonight’s game is also Junior and Senior High Appreciation Night with junior and senior high students and their chaperones getting in for free.
It’s also the second night for the Make Some Noise For Mental Health campaign.