Suntory Sunbirds Osaka swept both of their games at Voreas Hokkaido, leaving the opponents at the bottom of the table, in 10th place on 2-8 and 6 and a less favorable set ratio than that of Sakai. Suntory hammered out a 3-0 (25-17, 25-21, 25-21) victory in the first match, led by star outside hitter and captain Ran Takahashi with 12 points, including two blocks. Voreas’s Taiwanese opposite Chang Yu-Sheng was the best scorer of the match with 14 points, including two aces. The second match went 3-0 (25-16, 25-23, 25-20), with Russian opposite Dmitriy Muserskiy on top of the chart with 16 points, including two aces.
In front of over three thousand fans on each of the two days, third-placed Wolfdogs Nagoya also picked up six points on the road at Toray Arrows Shizuoka to improve to 7-3 and 21 and leave the opponents third from the bottom, in eighth place on 2-8 and 7. On Saturday, outside Taito Mizumachi fired four aces and raised three kill blocks towards a match-high 23-point contribution to a 3-1 (25-23, 21-25, 25-20, 25-19) victory. In Sunday’s 3-0 (25-22, 25-18, 25-23) sweep, opposite Kentro Miyaura (three aces) and Tunisian outside Aymen Bouguerra (one ace, one kill block) shared the top scorer honors with 13 points apiece towards their team’s win.
JTEKT Stings Aichi capitalized on Hiroshima’s setback to climb to fourth place on 6-4 and 18 after two three-pointers at Nagano Tridents. The visitors achieved a 3-1 (25-22, 25-23, 23-25, 25-18) victory on Saturday, powered by French opposite Stephen Boyer with a match-high 26 points, including four blocks. On Sunday, American outside Torey DeFalco led Aichi to a 3-0 (25-19, 25-16, 25-23) sweep with a team-high 18 points, including an ace and a block. Nagano’s Canadian opposite Matthew Neaves was the best scorer of this match with 24 points, including two blocks and an ace. Nagano descended to seventh place on 3-7 and 12.
