Ottawa, ON - The Algonquin Wolves men's volleyball team extended its perfect start to the 2025–26 season with a 3–1 victory over the Loyalist Lancers on Saturday night at the Jack Doyle Athletics & Recreation Centre. Playing in front of an energized home crowd on Mavericks Volleyball Club Appreciation Night.
Loyalist entered the match at 2–1 and came out strong in the opening set. The teams traded points early, with the Lancers holding a narrow 12–11 edge before Kyle Butler tied the frame with a left-side kill and Ethan Fisher followed with a block to give Algonquin the lead. The set remained tight throughout, but a pair of late Wolves errors allowed Loyalist to pull ahead 21–19, prompting a timeout from head coach Jelle Kooijman. Despite some big kills from Nick Gauthier Barber and Connor Finnie, the Lancers sided out effectively and capitalized on more Wolves miscues to take the opener 25–21.
The teams once again began the second set going back and forward. A big block from Mateo Nunez Kruus followed by another big kill from Finnie gave Algonquin the 6-4 lead. Gavin Hassell would head back to the service line where he delivered from strong serves to keep the Lancers out of system. After a kill from Finnie off a free ball, another big block from Ethan Fisher gave the Wolves a 10-6 lead. After a Lancer timeout, the Wolves kept the pressure on thanks to some incredible defensive plays from libero, Naoki Nakashima. After some long rallies lead to Lancer errors, Nunez Kruus came up with a big solo block in the middle to extend the lead to 19-11. An incredible rally, where both teams were diving all over the floor, culminated in a huge Connor Finnie kill, to give all the momentum to the Wolves, who took the set 25-15 to even up the match.
Algonquin seemed to find their groove after the second set, and never let the Lancers generate anything offensively as the Wolves out-blocked them 10-4, and out-dug them 56-49, and took the match 3-1 after back-to-back 25-21 set wins, moving to 3-0 on the season.
There were big performances on both sides of the ball for the Wolves:
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Connor Finnie had 19 kills and 1 block for 20 points
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Nick Gauthier Barber added 15 kills, 1 ace, and 3 blocks
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Mateo Nunez Kruus tallied 10 kills, and 1 block
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Ethan Fisher had 6 kills, 1 ace and 4 blocks
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Naoki Nakashima had a match high 21 digs
The Wolves will now prepare for a weekend road trip where they will take on the Durham Lords on Friday November 14th, then the St. Lawrence Surge on Saturday November 15th.
