The Conestoga Condors blanked the Hawks men's volleyball team 3-0 at the Humber Athletic Centre on Nov. 12.
The Hawks, coming off a 3-1 win against Redeemer, faced a tough Conestoga team, which currently has a 5-2 record and is third in the OCAA West standings. All the Condors’ wins have been sweeps.
“I think a lot of the strategy we put in a lot of our games, really just taking care of our side of the net, we can’t really worry about what they’re going to do,” Hawks coach Wayne Wilkins said.
“We’ve been practicing very well, we had a number of days off, we're coming into this pretty healthy, which is good, and it's been a ton of energy and a ton of effort,” he said.
The Hawks’ victory against the Redeemer Royals on Nov. 1 was boosted in a big way by rookie Enzo Endres’ stellar performance. He recorded 19 points with 16 kills. Endres said he was looking to follow up on his big game against Conestoga.
“With the same energy, I'm going to be crazy on the court, going to be yelling a lot and having fun,” Endres said. “Give it our all, destroy everyone that’s in our path and show them why we are the champs.”
The Hawks took the first lead of the first set against Conestoga with fifth-year outside hitter Teyven Blackmore getting a kill.
Both teams were trading points early on until the Condors took an 11-7 lead guided by back-to-back kills from Conestoga left sider Tyrell Belgrove, which led to the first timeout of the game by Humber.
After another Humber timeout late in the set, they were down 23-18 after two Hawks errors. Conestoga took the first set with a score of 25-18 after another pair of errors from the Hawks.
The second set stayed tight with the Hawks and Condors trading blows and leads.
Despite keeping it within one point for the majority of the set, the Hawks were unable to build a lead. Condor outside hitter Evan Kritz made the final kill, winning set two 25-23 and taking a commanding 2-0 lead.
In the third set, it was back-and-forth again. A valiant effort from Blackmore was not enough, and the Hawks dropped the third set 25-21.
After the game, outside hitter Kyle Gray-Phillips said it was a tough home loss to take.
“We have to move on and have a short-term memory. Definitely a learning opportunity from the game, but what’s done is done, and we have to shift our focus to the weekend,” he said.
“We didn't take care of the ball as well as we’d like on the service line and the reception. Just have to go back to the drawing board and work hard Friday night so that we’re prepared for the weekend,” Gray-Phillips said.
The Condors took the win three sets to none, becoming the first Conestoga team to win ever at Humber. The loss dropped the Hawks to 2-2, but they managed to move up in the OCAA Western Conference to fourth place after beating the Niagara Knights 3-0 on Nov. 15.
