Getting closer

The Lakehead Thunderwolves are getting better by the week.

But it doesn’t seem to be quite good enough yet to secure a win in the competitive OUA volleyball circuit. The Wolves women had their best chance yet on paper heading into their Friday home opener against the McMaster Marauders, but a few too many mistakes left them winless still.

It leaves them focused on righting their wrongs on Saturday, when the two teams meet again.

“Absolutely,” said returning star Vanessa Chorkaway, who spent last season training in Winnipeg, nursing an injury that sidelined her for the entire season.

“The split is the focus now. But we’ve got to execute our game plan. We came out soft tonight, expecting them to hand it to us. They were 0-3 as well, but it’s a fight every night and we’ve got to come out tomorrow and make sure we get the job done.”

Lakehead dropped a tight first set, falling 25-23, but rallied in the second riding a pair of Sarah Reid aces to a 25-20 win that tied the match.

But the Marauders fought back in the third, taking it by the same 25-20 score. Then McMaster (1-3) went on an 8-1 run in the decisive fourth set, and though twice they allowed LU to creep to within a point, they went on to finish off the 25-20 win when Shannon McRobert tipped the ball off the outstretched hands of the Thunderwolves defenders to end the match.

There are plenty of positives to take out of the loss, Chorkaway said.

“They’re definitely getting closer,” the Lively, Ont. native said. “We had a good crowd today, which is fun to play in. But we didn’t get the win, so it doesn’t matter,” she said.

The losing is starting to weigh heavy in the locker room, Chorkaway added.

“It is extremely frustrating. We prepared well for this came and we came out and didn’t execute today,” she said.

Assistant coach Mike Smit was given the task of speaking to media, and agreed with his star player’s sentiments.

“Yeah, it’s hard. We worked hard for two weeks and we had a lot of unforced errors tonight, a lot of hitting into the block, a lot of miss serves. Tomorrow we’ve got to work on that, where we’ve got to clean that up and come out strong,” Smit said.

The Wolves and Marauders will tip off on Saturday night, again at the Thunderdome, at 7 p.m.