On Thursday night after making the trek to Nanaimo the Avs were looking to keep their undefeated Pacwest record against the host VIU Mariners and jumped out to a quick 2-0 lead winning 2 close sets over the home side. The Mariners dug deep and battled back behind tough serving and a consistent attack to take sets 3 and 4 and send the match to a tiebreak 5th set. After jumping out to an early lead the tiebreak set would go down to the wire with the home side Mariners ultimately knocking the Avs from the ranks of the unbeaten with a 19-17 5th set victory. Offensively the Avalanche were led by Diego Policarpo and Reed Grusing with 22 and 21 points respectively. Libero Reece Clarke set a new career high for digs in a single match with 18, rookie Middles Luke Margenau and Noah Hadwen combined for a dozen points and Boston Thiessen tallied 46 assists from the setter position.
"Coming to Nanaimo and winning in this gym is about as tough of a job as possible in this conference and were so close to getting the job done tonight. A razor's edge separated these 2 teams tonight and we came up just short. There was a number of different areas that I thought we struggled to find a rhythm in and we still had a shot to win. Our Avs battled tonight."
The Mariners would complete back to back victories over the #1 ranked Avs with another match that went the distance. After VIU took the first set, a different lineup than Thursday for the Avalanche would take the next 2 sets before VIU sent this match to another 5th set. The Mariners would use strong serving and take advantage of late errors to win 15-12. With Diego Policarpo taking a night off, the Avs top scorer on the night was first year Jhet Bowen with 16 points from the opposite position, with Cade Schindel tallying 13, Jace Wilson 12 and Ethan Braam 10. Setter Brett Kester totalled 35 assists and added 3 points of his own.
"This 4 match road trip presents a number of challenges for our team in regards to load management and takes a toll on the body so we made sure our entire roster was prepared to make significant contributions and tonight you saw our depth on full display. This was another hard fought battle with the Mariners and unfortunately we just ran out of gas in the last portion of the match."
The Avs would continue down the island to Victoria to take on the Camosun Chargers on Saturday and looked to get back on track and appeared well on their way after taking the first set of the match, but the Chargers would right the ship and took control of the match after the opening set to deal the Avs their 3rd loss in a row in 4 sets. Leading the way for the road team was Diego Policarpo with 20 points, followed by Reed Grusing with 16 and 4th year libero Reece Clarke had another standout defensive match with 13 digs.
"I thought Camosun played about as well as possible tonight. They were far superior to us on both the service line and on reception, and its hard to win a match when you lose those 2 facets of the game. Coach Kelvin Ma made a number of adjustments against us compared to the first semester and kept us uncomfortable all night. Hats off to the Chargers"
Looking to end the island trip on a high note the Avs jumped out to a significant lead in the first set over the home side Chargers but Camosun was able to whittle that lead away and steal the first set in extra points. After falling behind 2-0 the Avs appeared to have things turned around in the 3rd set but Camosun once again would use a strong transition game to go on an 11 point run to take a lead that the Avs couldn't recover from and would take the match 3-0 over COTR. Diego Policarpo led the Avs in scoring with 15 but was the only team member in double figures as the Avs record falls to 14-4 going into a bye weekend. Coach Farrero had the following to say about the loss and the unsuccessful road trip.
"This is probably the toughest road trip any CCAA team has to take and I thought both of our opponents played really well this weekend. We felt uncomfortable and off-rhythm for the majority of the weekend, part of that is playing on the road, part of it is strong play by VIU and Camo but I also felt like we lacked our traditional fiery nature this weekend. I think we learned that we aren't invincible and that there is a blueprint out there on how to get us off our game. This group heads home still in first place and fully in control of our destiny still and I'm sure we will respond the right way in training to make necessary changes and adjustments."