Sacred Heart鈥檚 Sr. Boys Volleyball team travelled to La Loche to attend the SHSAA 4A Boys Volleyball Provincial Championships this past weekend.
Provincials took place on November 26-28 and were held at the Dene High School Gym and the Ducharme Elementary School Gym
The Saints team travelled up early on November 26th and arrived in La Loche in time for the welcoming supper. The team was greeted with an overwhelming amount of hospitality by the La Loche Community School.聽 That night the team attended the opening ceremonies at the High School. The team enjoyed the entertainment of the Dene drummers and dancers along with the explanation of the rich traditions of the Dene culture.
聽聽 聽On Friday, November 27th the Saints team started their first matches. The tournament consisted of two pools of five teams each. Pool A consisted of:聽 Melfort, Saskatoon Christian, Shaunavon, Unity and Yorton-Sacred Heart. Pool B consisted of:聽 Creighton, Fort Qu鈥橝ppelle, La Loche, Melville and Outlook.
Sacred Heart鈥檚 first match was against Melfort. In the opening set the Saints looked nervous and Melfort took an early lead with the Saints unable to battle back, falling 18-25 in the first set.
In the second set the Saints team re-grouped and played much stronger with some nice hits at the net.聽 The team still came up short losing the second set 18-25.
In the second match the team faced off against Shaunavon. Sacred had defeated this team earlier in the season and the Saints team came out swinging. Cody Doll and Bryan Buzinski put up some huge hits against Shaunavon while Kade Johnson and Nathan Cochrane put up a brick wall at the net.
In the first set the Saints team came up just short losing 19-25. Sacred fought back in the second set, but again came up just short losing 22-25 in a well fought effort.
In the third and final match on Friday the team faced Saskatoon Christian. In the first set, Sacred had a hard time controlling Saskatoon鈥檚 tall strong middle player. Saskatoon took the first set 25-21.
In the second set the Saints could taste a victory and had the adrenaline flowing on the court. Nick Kerr laid down some strong power hits at the net for the team. Points traded back and forth as the tension rose, but Saskatoon prevailed winning 28-26 as the Saints team took another hard loss to swallow.
聽聽 聽On Saturday, November 28th Sacred played the last match of the round robin versus the Unity Warriors.
After a rough first day for the Saints team, they were prepared for a battle against the Warriors. Sacred came out strong with Jonah Sutter laying down some big middle hits in the opening set as Sacred took the first set 25-23.
With the Saints first set win of the tournament, the team played extremely well showing determination to take the win. Nick Kerr shut down Unity鈥檚 left power hitter with two big blocks at the net. Then Kade Johnson crushed a left power hit at the net.
Sacred took momentum and defeated Unity 25-15 to send Unity home and out of playoffs. This put Sacred Heart in fourth place in pool A which put them into the playoffs against the first place team from pool B which was Melville, who went undefeated in the round robin play.
Sacred Heart brought 110% to the court and battled Melville鈥檚 big hitters. Jake Javier and Kaeden Hanishewsky did an amazing job digging the ball in the back row to keep the Saints alive.
Unfortunately for the Saints team, they were outplayed by Melville and were defeated 25-15, 25-18.
This was a crushing blow to the Saints team as it ended a great season of volleyball for the team.聽 Melfort went on to win the Provincial Gold, Saskatoon Christian won the Silver and the home town La Loche defeated Melville in the bronze match.
鈥淚 would like to thank the team for all their hard work this past season鈥� said coach Curtis Moen. 鈥淭he players did a great job to represent their school at the Provincial Championships.
鈥淭hey exemplified sportsmanship and embraced the amazing opportunity to learn about the Dene culture in this once in a lifetime trip.鈥�
The team will now wrap up the season at the annual Fall Sports Banquet on December 8.
