A member of the 2010 OFSAA volleyball championship team from Louis-Riel High School, St-Jean was named the most valuable player on the Ottawa Mavericks beach volleyball team in 2009. The Ottawa native will be immediately called upon as a leftside hitter for the Blues and is looking to pursue a degree in psychology while at U of T.

Sider, also a member of the Ottawa Mavericks, was invited to train at the Ontario High Performance Centre (HPC) in 2009. A member of New Brunswick’s under-16 team in 2008, she is a versatile player, comfortable both as an outside hitter and a middle. Sider will enter the Faculty of Physical Education and Health in September.

The team will train at the University of Toronto’s Varsity Sports Hall from July 12-20 before heading to Winnipeg for the 2010 NTTC.

varsityblues.ca

May (right) will be taking his all-round beach skills indoors

Ontario men’s top volleyball recruit Garrett May has committed to the Western Mustangs. May, from Toronto, describes himself as a “very competitive” athlete.

Western men’s volleyball head coach Jim Sage said May will make an immediate impact.

“He’s one of the top recruits in Canada. We are counting on Garrett to make a contribution for many years to our program.”

Sage describes May as a player with “outstanding all-round skills” who can play a number of impact positions.

“I love to compete in every point. I try my best to work hard at practice and in the games, and I love it when it pays off,” he said.

A two-time OFSAA gold medallist (2009, 2008) at Birchmount Park, May is a member of the Crush Volleyball Club, he won silver at the 2010 nationals championship and was named an all-star. He also won an Ontario gold medal in 2010 and won the OVA’s Ken Davies Memorial Award.

He said he has several goals while at Western.

“At university I want to become a starter, and eventually win a CIS championship,” he said. “Short term, I want to win the U19 and U21 World Beach Volleyball Championships. My ultimate goal is to win a gold medal at the Olympics.”

May is also an accomplished beach volleyball player, carded by Canada’s National Beach volleyball team in 2008 and 2009, finishing 9th at the 2009 U-19 World Beach volleyball championships. He is a current member of Canada’s national beach volleyball team.

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In its first year of existence, the Wildcats entered the provincials ranked 15th out of 42 clubs, with a goal of staying in the top tier and besting their 15th ranking. They ended up knocking off two of the top three teams in the province on their way to earning the silver medal.

Our gold-medal game was when we got into the final,” said Wildcats coach Danny Gosselin, noting the two-set sweep of the top-ranked Mississauga Pakmen in the semifinal.

This was the most significant coaching event in my life. I was so happy and so amazed. It was magical.”

The Wildcats club team is the first to reach a tier-one final at an OVA provincial championship…

Read more from Ken Pagan of The Nugget

“It’s been awesome,” he said. “It’s been an amazing experience.”

It often takes college players a while to adjust to the university level, but deGroot found success quickly. He switched from setter to libero in his final year with the Eagles and carried on at libero with the Gryphons, claiming Ontario University Athletics’ libero of the year award in both 2008-09 and 2009-10.

deGroot said the libero position, which was introduced into international volleyball in 1998, has added a lot to the game. Liberos are defensive specialists who sub in for weak passers during their backcourt rotations and often make the crucial first dig on serves or spikes.

As liberos aren’t allowed to spike or block above the net, height is less important than it is at other positions; deGroot, at 6′2”, is one of the taller liberos in CIS competition but one of the shortest players on his team. He said his height does give him an advantage, though.

“Being tall, you can cover more ground,” he said. “It’s still a tall man’s game.”

deGroot said the transition from setter to libero took a lot of work, but his setting experience has helped him in his new role.

“As a setter, you kind of see the whole game,” he said. “Working with my setter, I know what he’s thinking; I know what he needs.”

Get the full story…Andrew Bucholtz, sportingmadness.ca

Thompson Rivers head coach Pat Hennelly said the Gaels played a solid game.

“Give Queen’s credit; they did a lot of good things,” he said. “In the fourth and the fifth, their defence really paid off. We just didn’t show enough energy.”

Queen’s head coach Brenda Willis said the team’s performance at nationals should help validate Queen’s as a solid volleyball program.

“It always feels good when you win,” she said. “We came in seeded fifth and I think a lot of people believed we shouldn’t be fifth, that we weren’t as good as anyone in Canada West. Canada West is a great conference, but we really believe that with this group of athletes, if we had the chance to play at this level all the time, we’d be as good as anybody.”

The Gaels lost their first match in straight sets to the Trinity Western Spartans Friday, knocking them out of the championship-side bracket, but they beat the Université de Montréal Carabins Saturday to advance to the fifth-place final against the WolfPack.

The Spartans went on to the tournament final, which Willis said makes the loss to them more palatable for Queen’s.

“When you lose to number-one or number-two and you win your next two, there’s nothing to be ashamed of,” she said. “We’re pretty happy.”

Queen’s setter Dan Rosenbaum said the team bounced back nicely from their opening loss.

“After day one against Trinity Western, we were pretty discouraged,” he said. “Once we realized we could still come out of the tournament with two wins and one loss, we decided to come out and play.”

Rosenbaum said the team’s performance should help OUA schools’ reputation, especially considering that the Gaels weren’t ranked in the national Top 10 heading into the tournament.

“I think it’s a good statement game for the OUA,” he said. “There’s a lot of naysayers out there that like to put down Ontario volleyball. Hopefully in the next couple of years, we can prove them wrong and be in the conversation with the top volleyball teams in the nation.”

Rosenbaum said the team’s hoping to build on this performance for the next few seasons.

“I think it works really well with our five-year plan, hosting nationals in what would be mine and Bryan and Joren [Zeeman] and Niko [Rukavina]’s fifth year,” he said. “To win OUAs and get to CIs this year was a really good experience. Hopefully we can use that to move forward next year and in our fifth year, get ready to win a medal.”

Andrew Bucholtz, queensjournal,ca

Joren Zeeman recorded 24 points for Queen’s; Bryan Fautley added 11 kills while Niko Rukavina had 10. Winston Rosser of Whitby, Ont., was the leading hitter for Guelph with 14 kills

With the win, Queen’s advances to next weekend’s CIS Men’s Volleyball Championships at Thompson Rivers University in Kamloops, B.C.

CIS

Get the full story from Jamie Howieson www.gogaelsgo.com

Reid just completed his first full season leading the Ryerson Rams women’s volleyball team, after being named head coach in November, 2008. The team has made a marked improvement since Reid took the helm. The Rams finished just out of the playoffs with an 8-11 record, but recorded their highest number of wins in five seasons.

A native of Newtonville, Reid grew up in Orono, attending Kirby Public School and Clarke High School. His contribution to the sport of volleyball started early, standing out as a top player on his high school volleyball team while also playing high school basketball, rugby and hockey.

“He’s had such a long career,” said his mother, Cheryl Reid. “It started at Clarke High School.” She said her son decided to concentrate on playing volleyball after his friend and mentor Ken Davies – a volleyball player at Clarke, four years Reid’s senior – was killed in 1989 by a drunk driver.

“Ken had some goals in mind for his own career,” explained Cheryl Reid. “Ken always wanted to play for Team Canada, and that prompted Dustin to pursue volleyball almost exclusively.”

Read more Sue Weigard

In a fitting twist to the OUA volleyball campaign, the Marauders will meet the Guelph Gryphons in their semi-final encounter this Friday, March 5. The Gryphons have been a perpetual thorn in Mac’s side this season, beating the OUA leaders in both of their previous games (3-1 and 3-0). Considering that the Marauders lost only three games in total, Guelph’s achievement is both impressive and puzzling. Either way, Mac will have the chance to redeem themselves in elimination play and put an end to the giant-killers.

Read more from Fraser Caldwell, the Si.ca

Queens University punched in its ticket to this weekend’s conference Final Four men’s volleyball tournament eliminating the University of Toronto Varsity Blues 25-15, 25-14, 27-25 on Friday night in OUA Conference quarterfinal action.

The Gaels, vying for their third Ontario university title in five years, were led by Joren Zeeman with 15 points, one of four players on the team to score in double digits. Mitchell Woodside and Adam Palmer had eight points each for Toronto.

McMaster has a bye to the Final Four as the top regular season team.

Read more including CIS West ,Volleyball Canada

University of Toronto Varsity Blues

In the 2007-2008 OUA championship final it was the McMaster Marauders defeating the Varsity Blues at the University of Toronto. The Blues returned the favour Saturday night at McMaster’s Burridge Gym, sweeping the OUA final 3-0 (25-20, 25-23, 25-19). They are heading west to the University of Alberta in Edmonton to compete for the CIS Championships to be held  from Friday, March 5 to Sunday, March 7.

- Follow the Blues… http://english.cis-sic.ca/championships/wvball
- TV: Bronze-medal game and final on Shaw (local) and Star Choice (across Canada)
- Webcast (SSN Canada): All games (main bracket & consolation)
- Live stats: Available on website
- Berths (8 teams): Host (Alberta), CWUAA (3), QSSF (2), OUA (1), AUS (1)