The Supervolley season is officially underway and in front of a boisterous home crowd the Porter Creek Rams, last year’s champion, took on the runner up F.H. Collins Warriors on Thursday afternoon.

The tides changed to start the new season and the Warriors defeated the Rams in straight sets 3-0.

From the opening serve, the Warriors took control of the first set. Their serve game was strong and they got the Rams scrambling and out of system early. Unable to generate the offence, the Rams gave the Warriors plenty of free-balls.

The Warriors free-ball passing was on point and to the setter, so they were able to run all of their attackers. Emma Boyd and player of the game, Maya Cairns-Locke, led the offensive attack as the Warriors jumped out to an early 13-5 lead.

The Warriors’ strong play continued and they minimized their mistakes and the Rams never looked comfortable, as the first set ended 25-13 for F.H.

Cairns-Locke said there was some rust to brush off in the opening set.

“Our first set was really good, all our sets were great,” said Cairns-Locke. “But we definitely have to work on getting louder and getting fired up, but for sure we had a pretty strong start.”

Porter Creek found their footing in the second set in what proved to be a much closer race to 25.

The Warriors continued their strong passing and attack but the Rams were playing really scrappy defence.

The second featured plenty of rallies which both teams won their fair share of sending the packed bleachers into a chorus of loud cheers. Cairns-Locke said playing on the Rams floor can be intimidating.

“Honestly, here, it’s such a big gym, and especially because we were playing during school hours all the students came to watch,” said Cairns-Locke. “It was definitely a little bit nerve-wracking because we are on their turf but we took it so it was pretty good.”

It remained close throughout but the Warriors were able to build a small advantage which they would not relinquish on their way to a 25-21 win. Cairns-Locke said the Rams gave them everything they could handle, especially when the Porter Creek defence was digging everything.

“They are always great competition,” said Cairns-Locke. “It was really exciting. We’d get a huge hit and then it wasn’t the end of the rally. It was up and back over and we’d hit again. It was really great.”

Any momentum the Rams gained from their strong second set faded in the third. They were still digging the heavy hits from the Warriors attackers and creating rallies, they just weren’t coming out on the winning end of most.

The Warriors held steady and played composed volleyball through the third and won the final set of the best of five match 25-12.

F.H. will have two weeks between games and will play the Vanier Crusaders when it’s their time to get back on the court. Cairns-Locke said she expects the team to be better by that point.

“We are expecting to put everything away and take every point we can get and get some big wins,” said Cairns-Locke. “Next practice we will be running so we will be all ready for the next game.”

The Rams player of the game was Iliana Stechin. She came up with big plays on the offensive and defensive side of the ball and was the loudest Porter Creek player on the court.

Porter Creek won’t have to wait long for their chance to put a W in the win column. The Rams are back on their home court when they play the Vanier Crusaders tonight.