The Vancouver Island University Mariners lived up to their pedigree as two-time defending CCAA national champions, knocking off the UFV Cascades in three straight sets on Friday in Nanaimo.

The Mariners (3-0) prevailed by scores of 25-19, 25-21 and 25-21 to hand the Cascades (2-1) their first loss of the young PACWEST season. The two teams wrap up their weekend series at 1 p.m. Saturday (pacwestbc.tv).

"They make a lot less mistakes," said Cascades head coach Janelle Rozema, reflecting on the difference between the Cascades and a championship-tested squad like the Mariners at this early stage. "They're just a little more refined, and they really make us earn our points. We want to make them work hard for their points, and I think we kind of took a step back today."

Indeed, the Cascades gave the Mariners 27 points combined on service and attacking errors, compared to just 19 such errors for VIU. Beyond that, UFV had a tough time containing VIU's aggressive servers.

"Our serve-pass game really struggled," Rozema said. "Credit to VIU – they served really tough, but we have to be better in our serve-receive.

"For tomorrow, we just have to pass better and serve tougher. We can't serve easy, but we can't give them as many points as we gave them. We're going to focus on cleaning up our errors."

Amanda Matsui's nine kills were a team-high for the Cascades, while Chelsea Kidd (six kills) and Sedona Arabsky (five kills, three aces) also chipped in offensively. Matsui racked up 20 digs, and libero Stephanie Demeules (10) and Kidd (10) also finished in double digits.

Danielle Groenendijk (16 kills) and Jane Nyukhalova (14 kills) were highly efficient for the Mariners.