Box Score
The Waterloo men's volleyball team clinched their third straight OUA final four berth with a 3-1 (22-25, 25-17, 25-21, 27-25) win over the Queen's Gaels on Saturday night.  The Warriors will face familiar foe, Western for the third straight year in the OUA semi's hoping for a different result this time around.

The victory didn't come as easy as Chris Lawson and his team would have liked as the pesky Gaels battled Waterloo every inch of the way.

The opening set did not go the way of the Warriors with sloppy passing and several hitting errors which the visiting Gaels took full advantage of.  Rookie setter Jamie Wright of the Gaels stepped to the service line and gave his squad six straight points to open up a 22-17 lead which would eventually turn into a 25-22 first set win.

After even play in the second set the Warriors would find their groove going on an 8-0 run to take an 18-13 lead.  The Gaels would however battle their way back to within two but an incredible save by Zachary Doherty (Goderich/) setting up James Evans (Rockwood) for the kill would ignite the Warriors and give them the set 25-17.

Waterloo would maintain their momentum into the third and pivotal set going up 8-3 in the early going.  The resilient Gaels would however battle their way back into the set before the point of the match came at 17-13 with Aleks Poldma (Toronto) capping it off with a tremendous attack.  The Warriors would get several key attacks up the middle from Jordan Dyck (St. Catharines/) and Tyler Motherwell (Toronto) to close out the set 25-21.

The fourth set would once again see Waterloo take a 16-9 lead but the never-say-die Gaels once again fought their way back into the set tying things up at 20-all.  Back-to-back kills by Motherwell and Poldma would put Waterloo up 22-20 and the Warriors could see the finish line but the Gaels again evened the scored sending this set the distance. 

With Waterloo up 26-25, Dyck would close out his strong game with a kill up the middle to seal the 3-1 victory and punch Waterloo's ticket to the OUA final four.

Dyck was a force for the Warriors with eight kills on just 14 attempts while adding a game high eight blocks.  Motherwell was also a factor up the middle with 11 kills in the contest.

From the outside Waterloo got offensive output from all three of their veteran stars with Evans leading the way with 14 kills.  Poldma and Doherty added 13 and 11 kills respectively in the win.

Setting up Waterloo all night long was Scott Thomson (St. Marys/) with 50 assists while libero Erich Woolley (New Dundee/) had 10 digs.

For Queen's it was Mike Tomlinson earning 20 points on his 15 kills, four service aces, and one block.

Waterloo will turn their attention to the Mustangs and with a win will book their ticket to the CIS Championship tournament.  The OUA semifinal game goes Friday night in Hamilton at 5:30pm.