Jefferson Hagen, MacEwan Athletics
EDMONTON – Kylie Schubert received a historic honour for the MacEwan Griffins on Wednesday.
The women's volleyball setter became the first MacEwan student-athlete to receive a U SPORTS athlete of the week award.
Schubert, who was named Canada West first star of the week on Tuesday, captured the U SPORTS female athlete of the week a day later as part of a Canada West sweep with male athlete of the week Brett Layton of the Calgary Dinos men's basketball team.
"It shows the hard work from all the athletes and coaches over the last six years in Canada West (is paying off)," said Griffins women's volleyball head coach Ken Briggs of the historic honour. "It's taken us a long time to be recognized as a competitive program. We've certainly had some tremendous individual performances in all our years.
"Team results really make a difference. The last few years we're right in the hunt."
Schubert tied a program single-game record for assists last Friday night with 53 in MacEwan's 3-1 win over Saskatchewan and finished the two-game series with 85 total assists and 20 digs.
"I was surprised when I saw that," said Schubert of tying Rebecca Martin's mark from the 2014-15 season. "I thought that was pretty cool.
"We've been playing pretty well. In order to have that high of a number of assists, we need to have good passing and our hitters need to be hitting the right shots. That was all flowing good, so I think that was pretty cool to end up tying that record."
Only three players have had more assists in a match this Canada West women's volleyball season, but all of those have come in five-set games, not the four that Schubert accomplished her mark in.
Schubert's ability to spread the ball around was evident in the Friday night's victory as MacEwan had four players in double digits for kills (Hailey Cornelis -17, Haley Gilfillan – 16, Mckenna Stevenson – 13 and Lauren Holmes – 11).
In Saturday's 3-0 loss to the Huskies, Schubert still managed to produce 32 assists.
Combined in both games, Schubert added 20 digs.
For the season, Schubert is fifth in Canada West in assists (442) and in assists/set (9.40).
She leads the Griffins into home action against UBC on Friday (6 p.m.) and Saturday (5 p.m., both in David Atkinson Gym, Canada West TV presented by Co-op).