Reds And Tommies Meet In Exhibition

(FREDERICTON, NB) The UNB REDS and St. Thomas Tommies played five sets of exhibition women’s volleyball on Saturday afternoon.

It was the first game action for both teams in the 2020-21 season.

The REDS, of Atlantic University Sport, and the Tommies, who play in the Atlantic Colleges Athletic Association, both had their regular seasons cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“It was so nice to be on the court against someone who wasn’t our own team, it was really nice, it was really exciting,” said REDS fourth year hitter Bailey Lemieux. 

Tommies’ fifth year hitter Megan Mills echoed Lemieux’s sentiment.

“It was great to be back on the court and have an actual game, and not just practice.,” she said. “I think both teams played very well. It was a great match, lots of fun, just happy to be back.”

Neither team had seen any game action since their respective conference championship tournaments, in February of 2020.

Both teams admit, even after months of training and practice, there was a mental rust they had to shake off.

“The pre-game excitement was through the roof, so controlling that and, maybe, a little bit of nerves, we kind of struggled coming out of the gate,” said REDS interim head coach Geoff Mabey. “I think they got into the rhythm of what it’s like to play again, so I thought it was good after that.”

Saturday’s match was played at UNB’s Richard J. Currie Center, which was closed to spectators.

“That was wonderful, just to have them on the court,” said Tommies head coach Don McKay. “The first two sets I thought we were competitive and in it, but today’s goal was to get everybody on the court and get some playing time, it was the first time we’ve seen them, and, obviously, it’s going to be an adjustment and next time we play them maybe we’ll get a few Ws as well.”

Mills was happy with the Tommies’ performance.

“I think we did a little bit of everything well. We played defence extremely well, and blocking is something that we’ve been working on and I noticed a huge improvement on that.”

Lemieux says the REDS were pleased with their game too, and were happy to see some new faces on the other side of the net.

“In practice you get into a rhythm, and pick up on each other’s cues,” she said. “Like, I’ll know more of Catherine’s tendencies as a setter, whereas having a new team come in, it’s more like game mode and you have to focus on everything instead of just knowing.”

“We all executed really well, we communicated really well, it’s something we’ve been working on, effective communication, so I think we did that really well,” said Lemieux. “We had some missed serves, but after something bad happened, we did a really good job of coming together and solving the problem.”

The teams will return to practice this week with a conditional re-match in the works for next weekend.

RECAP AND PHOTOS BY: Andy Campbell/UNB Athletics