Kevin Rothbauer Citizen
Duncan Christian School and Brentwood College are off to their respective provincial girls volleyball championships after capturing the Island single-A and AA banners last weekend.
The host DCS Chargers went undefeated in pool play at the single-A Island tournament. They beat Nanaimo Christian 25-10, 25-14 in the first round of the playoffs, then defeated St. Andrew’s 25-16, 25-23 in the semifinals. Finally, they beat Ucluelet 25-13, 25-23 in the gold-medal match.
Chemainus Secondary finished fifth in the tournament. The Cougars went 2-2 in pool play, then ousted Port Hardy in the first round of the playoffs before winning 25-21, 25-13 over Nanaimo Christian in the fifth/sixth game.
The Lake Cowichan Lakers ended up ninth in the tournament, while the Queen Margaret’s School Royals were 10th.
Danielle Groenendijk of Duncan Christian was named tournament MVP. Tournament all-stars included Hannah Day and Juliet King of DCS, Jessica Roe of Chemainus, Avii Ursulom of Lake Cowichan and Kelsea Sebastian of QMS.
Brentwood won the AA tournament in Nanaimo. Also going through pool play undefeated, Brentwood advanced straight to the semifinals, where they beat Kwalikum three sets to none, setting up a championship match against host Woodlands.
Brentwood lost the first two sets 25-23, 25-19 to trail 2-0, but fought back to win 25-15, 25-23, 15-12.
“It was a little too stressful,” Brentwood coach Jill Fougner said. “It was crazy. Woodlands played so well. Hats off to them. They were fired up, and we were not so much at the start.”
Allie Waddell was named tournament MVP, while Lauren Yanick and Taylor Collombin were named tournament all-stars.
DCS will head to Castlegar for their provincial tournament on Dec. 3-5, while Brentwood will be in Kelowna the same weekend.
“The Fraser Valley has the top four teams in the province, so we’ll be in tough for sure,” Fougner said. “But we are continuing to play better and better, and I don’t think we have peaked as yet. As always, we go into these hoping to medal, for sure.”