Breakers Take Bronze
During the first practice of the season, the Northumberland Breakers 16U boy’s volleyball team set its goal for the campaign: medal at the provincial championships.
Although this team has earned its share of medals in regular tournaments, the Ontario Volleyball Championship tournament is the definitive end of the season where each team and players brings their best game.
The members of this Breakers club have played together for five seasons, but needed to make some important improvements to reach their goal.
“One of the things the team needed to work on was developing the ability to win important clutch games,” said head coach Gord Ley.
“At times they could do this, but they needed to do it reliably in order to put themselves in a position to medal at the provincials.”
That is exactly what the Breakers were able to do. They did not medal during the regular season but were able to win those clutch matches and hold their fourth to fifth place position all season.
At the provincials, every match is an important one. The Breakers came into the OVA event seeded fourth, having made some impressive improvements with their setting and middle attack over the course of the season.
“This team has practiced hard all season and it’s been a pleasure to watch these boys take their game to the next level. I knew they were ready and I believed their chances were good,” Ley said.
“On the first day in Waterloo there were 28 Ontario teams playing off for the right to play at the upper tier. I expected we would win our pool but you can’t take anything for granted at the provincials. Everybody else has the same goal you do.”
Breakers were undefeated the first day, earning them a spot in Tier 1 play. They met some tough competition from the Riverside team from Windsor. Although the Breakers claim the best-of-three match in straight sets, they have a history with Riverside.
“This team squashed our medal hopes last year and it was a very good omen to beat them without any difficulty. It was also satisfying” said Ley.
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