Coming off an awe-inspiring season, the Warriors women’s volleyball are looking to carry that momentum and use it to help them find success in a competitive OUA women’s volleyball playoff bracket. The Warriors finished off the regular season with a 14-6 record. With this, they finished fifth in the OUA and earned themselves an opportunity to compete for the Quigley Cup.
How is the OUA playoff set up?
- Within OUA women’s volleyball, unlike other sports, there are no divisions. Upon completion of the regular season, the eight teams with the best win-loss record move on to compete in the playoffs.
- The team with the best record is given the number one seed, and then the next seven teams are seeded according to their wins and losses. Matchups are set up in such a way that the top-seeded teams will play the lower-seeded teams (first vs eighth, second vs seventh, third vs sixth, fourth vs fifth). Teams are not reseeded as the playoffs progress.
- Each playoff game is a single elimination, the higher-seeded team in the matchup hosts the competition.
- The playoffs include three rounds of competition: quarterfinals, semi-finals, championships.
Warriors playoff positioning
- With the Warriors finishing 14-6, they received the fifth seed in the playoffs and will be travelling to Hamilton to take on the fourth seeded McMaster Marauders in the quarterfinals on Friday, Feb. 21
- Ironically enough, the Warriors closed out their season with back-to-back matchups against McMaser. They split the series winning the first matchup 3 sets to 2, but losing the second one 0-3 both on home court. Back in early October, they travelled to McMasters’ home court and lost 3 sets to 2.
- This season the Warriors are 1-2 against the Marauders. Seems like no better time than the playoffs to even up that matchup!
- The winner of this match-up will advance to the semi-finals to take on the winner of the University of Queens vs University of Toronto.
Players to watch
- Rachael Meilikhan: #4 fifth year, left side
- Second in province in kills/set and total kills (3.82, 279)
- Fourth in province aces/set (.44)
- Leads team in total kills and total aces
- Sydney DeGraauw: #3 fourth year middle
- Second in province in hit percentage (.311)
- Second in province in blocks/set (1.12)
- Team lead in total blocks (69)
- Madison Seo: #9 second year setter
- Top 10 in Province in assists/set (7.91)
- Leads team in total assists (477)
It is safe to say that both the Marauders and the Warriors are familiar with how each other plays and what they need to do to secure a victory. This matchup is shaping up to be a great one as it will mark the fourth time that these two squads go at it. Go Warriors!
