KAMLOOPS – All three sets came right down to the wire but unfortunately for the limited capacity sellout crowd inside the Tournament Capital Centre, all three sets went the way of the visiting UBC Okanagan Heat in a 3-0 (25-23, 25-23, 25-23) victory over the host Thompson Rivers WolfPack men's volleyball team.
 
"We were fighting ourselves a little bit, fighting the nerves," said WolfPack head coach Pat Hennelly. "A lot of our contributors are in their first year of Canada West play, so I thought overall it was good but that we just really couldn't get any sustained pressure on them in terms of getting a couple serves in a row or letting balls drop."
 
Despite the 3-0 final score, there wasn't much to split the teams on the night. With set after set going down to the final points, it was a more experienced Heat side that was able to pull out the clutch plays when they needed them most.
 
Fifth-year utility player Anton Napolitano once again led the way for the WolfPack, recording a team-high 10 kills and also picking up seven digs. Matthew Hamilton finished with eight kills while Thundersky Walkingbear racked up six kills and three aces.
 
"Anton has set for the last couple years and now we're asking him to hit so he's in a tough spot, but I thought he did great," said Hennelly.
 
Maxwell Heppell was on fire for UBCO, finishing on 13 of his 20 attacks in the match to finish with a game-high 13 kills. Cameron Vanderveen added nine and Zach Van Geel put up 25 assists for the visitors.
 
"It's tough to win when we can't keep pressure on and their number three (Heppel) had a great night tonight, he answered the bell every time and came up big for them so credit to a guy that played great," said Hennelly.
 
The WolfPack weren't able to recover from a late UBCO rally in the first set.
 
With the game tied at 20, two-straight aces from Caleb Funk and a WolfPack error gave the visitors the three-point lead. In what would become a theme throughout the game, the 'Pack refused to go down without a fight however, and two Walkingbear kills and a UBCO error later the game was knotted right back up. From there it was all Heppell though, as the product of Langley finished the set with back-to-back kills.
 
The WolfPack led 19-15 in the second set before the Heat came storming back to tie the game at 21. After the teams traded points to get to 23-all, it was once again the Heat who scored the final two points of the set to take 25-23.
 
In the third set it was the WolfPack's turn to claw back from an early hole, running the score all the way from 19-13 to 23-21. Back-to-back kills from Corbin Ockerman and Napolitano knotted the set up before van Geel scored the final point of the match for UBCO.
 
"The question is are we learning from this, or are we going to get the yips when this situation comes around again," said Hennelly . "It's not a bad result for our home opener with a young team, but it's not the result I wanted, I thought we could have been a little sharper and cleaner. This is a taste of what we can do but I'm hoping we can be more consistent tomorrow."
 
The rivalry rematch will go tomorrow afternoon at 3:45 p.m. when the 'Pack once again take on the Heat. Tickets for that contest can be found on gotruwolfpack.ca and the game can be watched live on canadawest.tv.