A vehicle includes a clutch, pump, pressure control variable force solenoid (PVFS) valve in a branch supplying oil from the pump to the clutch through a flow control VFS (QVFS), and a controller. The controller calculates an area of a variable orifice of the QVFS valve at the start of a clutch shift, records the area as a maximum area, and calculates a maximum branch pressure as a function of the area. The controller limits pressure in the branch during the shift event to the calculated maximum branch pressure. The transmission may be a dual-clutch transmission (DCT) with the clutch being a DCT input clutch. A control system includes a host machine, temperature and pressure sensors, a computer-readable medium with instructions for limiting branch pressure as a function of the maximum area noted above and using sensor values from the sensors. A method of limiting branch pressure is also disclosed.