With a boisterous capacity crowd behind them, the Brandon University Bobcats roared to a straight-sets (25-19, 25-19, 25-22) upset of the top-seeded Winnipeg Wesmen on Friday to reach the semifinals of the U SPORTS Men's Volleyball Championship - presented by Sunrise Credit Union.

The eight-seeded Bobcats have earned a matchup with the No. 5 Saskatchewan Huskies on Saturday at 6 p.m., at the Healthy Living Centre.

"So much adrenaline and excitement go through your body when you have a game like that. We haven't played any game just like it, and it was a blast," said Bobcat Tom Friesen, who was a force all night with seven kills, three service aces and seven digs. "It's so good to be at home and to have that crowd behind you. I felt like that was a huge part of the energy out there."

The Bobcats played a tidy all-around game, hitting with .247 efficiency while limiting the the Canada West conference champions to a .080 clip.

"I thought that was as good as we played, perhaps all season," said Bobcats head coach Grant Wilson, who celebrated his birthday with the momentous win. "We were pretty focused right from the first serve. Our goal was to try to be better at the first touch (off the serve), which is not easy against that team because they have been better at the first touch than most teams all year. We were able to compete with them with that first touch and it allowed us to find success."

Riley Grusing led the Bobcats with 10 kills, while Philipp Lauter added eight kills, with only one error, and seven blocks. Isaiah Olfert paced the Wesmen with 11 kills.

The host Bobcats started well, with three early Liam Pauls kills helping BU get out to a quick lead. Down 18-11, the Wesmen rallied with five straight points coming out of a timeout before the Bobcats recovered with a 5-0 run of their own.

The second set followed a similar pattern, with a series of big blocks by Lauter and J.J. Love helping the Bobcats take an 18-12 advantage before a Friesen ace put BU one set away from the semifinals. The Bobcats followed through in a close third set, finished off by a Lauter kill.

Friesen liked the resilience his team showed to respond whenever the Wesmen made a push.

"(The Wesmen are) a good team. They're going to make you fight for everything, but we've been playing volleyball a long time," Friesen said. "You've just got to focus on the next point, and we did that well."

The Wesmen, who lost only three matches in the Canada West season, with one of them coming to the Bobcats, will play on the consolation side on Saturday.