Fabian Breitenbach led the Griffins with 11 kills on Saturday (Husain Dhooma photo).
Fabian Breitenbach led the Griffins with 11 kills on Saturday (Husain Dhooma photo).
February 1, 2026

Peaks remain impressive, but Griffins get stuck in their valleys too long during 3-0 loss to Brandon

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Jefferson Hagen
MacEwan Athletics 

EDMONTON – As has often been the case with the Griffins men's volleyball team, their highlight reel contains plays that are as impressive as anyone in Canada West.

Their peaks are fantastic.

It's the valleys that remain the issue.

That was certainly the difference in Saturday's match, which featured three competitive sets with visiting Brandon showing more consistency and finding the clutch points to win 3-0 (25-22, 25-20, 25-19).

"The high-level stuff is so good and it's absolutely at a U SPORTS level," said Griffins head coach Brad Poplawski. "At times, we pass the ball, set the ball, attack the ball, block the ball, serve the ball at a level way past where our record is. 

"But then it's a run of three points that are completely within our control. We make an overbump, we make a bad swing, make a bad decision.

"When we make an error right now, I don't know if it's a confidence thing, but it seems like it's never just one and done. We don't back up our good things. We hit one great serve and then we miss it. But if we pass a bad ball, we pass another one."

With the result, the Griffins fall to 0-18, while Brandon improves to 7-9.

Ethan Baraniuk led the Bobcats with 12 kills, while Matthew Siebenga had six kills, four digs and four blocks.

MacEwan was led by Fabian Breitenbach, who is starting to find his first semester form after recovering from an injury and had 11 kills. Spencer Loucks came through with three kills, two aces and five blocks.

"I thought he looked a lot more comfortable this weekend," said Poplawski of Breitenbach, who had 24 kills in six sets over the weekend. "His mom is here from Germany, so I thought that was pretty cool that she got to see him play in person in Canada.

"When he's on, obviously, he's a weapon for us."

The teams traded points for most of the opening set, but the Bobcats never trailed after 19-19. They got away with a botched pass to go up 23-22 when Baraniuk hit it off the block and past the baseline before Matt Lefebvre and Siebenga teamed up to block Breitenbach and set up set point. Brandon server Riley Brunet closed it out on an ace.

In the second set, the Bobcats had a little bit more breathing room, going up 21-17. Both Daylan Laszlo and Breitenbach hit nice kills through the block from the left side, but the Griffins just weren't able to make up any more ground. The set ended on a MacEwan miscommunication that led to four hits on their side of the court.

That bad juju bled over into Set 3 as MacEwan had a wave of errors to fall behind 10-3.

"We didn't get out of the gates at all," said Poplawski. "Just got stuck in a rotation. 

"It's just one of those things. Passing error, setting error, hitting error and then around the horn where it becomes a run of five to six points.

"We fought back. We put Lincoln (Pinchuk) in to give them a little bit of a different look. We made a push, but we were down 9-2. It's kind of academic at that point. I like that our guys didn't quit, they didn't fold the tent, they did fight back and I think we made it 13-10.

"It's just too hard to come all the way back. You spend so much energy just trying to draw even and eventually it becomes too much. They're too good where they're not going to spot us a 9-2 run."

Pinchuk was a bright spot, showing some glimpses of his potential, but the deficit was too much as Brandon ended the match on their second set point attempt when Thomas Friesen hammered it home.

The Griffins next hit a bye week before closing out the season at the Saville Centre against the Alberta Golden Bears Feb. 13-14. 

Poplawski will continue looking for ways for his team to be on the peaks and out of the valleys more often.

"I've been talking to our sports psych about confidence," he said. "It's just finding ways to get out of it sooner because the high-level stuff and good stuff is so good. So, I know the guys have the potential and the ability to do it. 

"As a coach, I'm just racking my brain trying to figure out how to not have our valleys so low because our peaks are quite good."