A kill-er career
Dax Whitehead had just hammered his way into the Lethbridge College Kodiaks and Alberta Colleges Athletic Conference history books. When the spotlight came, the fifth-year veteran of the Kodiaks men’s volleyball team was eager to share it.
On Friday night in the Kodiaks 3-1 win over the Briercrest Clippers, Whitehead put up seven kills.
One of those was the 1,000th of his ACAC career, making him the first Kodiak to reach that mark and the fourth ACAC men’s volleyball player to do so.
A split second after that 1,000th kill hit the Val Matteotti Gymnasium floor, the game ground to a halt as Whitehead’s teammates joined him on the floor to celebrate while the accomplishment was announced over the PA to the hometown crowd.
“It felt good. A thousand kills was nice, but having support from the crowd and my team, that was really nice,” said Whitehead. “They announced that it was my 1,000 kill. They took the ball off to the side for me. Everyone stood up and started clapping. I got a few goosebumps, it felt nice.”
As for that historic ball, Whitehead made sure his teammates were a part of that as well.
“I’m going to let the guys sign it and leave it in the house.”
On Saturday, Whitehead had another 12 kills as the Kodiaks clinched another sweep with a 31 win that improves them to 8-0 this season.
That gives him 76 kills this year and with the season not even half over, Whitehead has the chance to surpass the other three ACAC athletes who have topped the 1,000 mark.
All-time kill lead Blazej Pellowski, who played for the Keyano College Huskies from 2013-18 sits at 1,108.
Scott Lesher (Briercrest from 2008-13) has 1,065 and Alwyn Piche (Keyano, 2006-09 and 2012-13) is third at 1,033.
“Dax is a pretty impressive guy,” said Kodiaks head coach Greg Gibos. “He’s a guy who has been here for five years and completely dedicated himself to this program. He epitomizes exactly what we want our Kodiaks to be. You can see that as well with a guy like Carter Hansen. He’s not that far away from 1,000 (kills) and they are two guys that have been in this program for a long time. They’re not just great volleyball players, but great people and ambassadors for our sport in southern Alberta. You could see that was reflected in the crowd (Friday) night. We had a big, loud gym full of young athletes who are excited to play volleyball in southern Alberta and I think it has a lot to do with the group of guys we have in the gym right now.”
The Kodiaks went into the weekend ranked fifth in the Canadian Collegiate Athletic Association rankings.
“I’ve been saying for three years that it’s a special group of guys,” said Gibos. “They’re really dedicated not only to the betterment of themselves, but the betterment of the program and they are guys who are really invested in wearing our logo with a lot of pride. For them to come together and work toward some educational goals and some athletic goals, I can’t speak enough about the group of leaders that we have in our gym every night and now they’re getting their due justice with a good record. So it has been really exciting for us.”