College Heights girls place 11th at provincials

— “We went in there ranked eighth in the province and we moved up to fourth place,” said Guillet. “We had a phenomenal match against George Elliot and even in our semifinal against Abby Christian, we played quite well. Their coach said they had probably one of their best matches of the provincials to beat us.

“We’ve played Duchess Park a number of times and they know how we play and we know how they play but we didn’t match up well against them today.”

Cougars Matthew Shand and Nolan Minck were picked as tournament all-stars. The Cougars also won the most sportsmanlike team award.

Drezet said the lack of competition in the north central zone and the isolation of being located a full day’s drive away from the province’s population centres were determining factors in the provincial tournament. It took the Condors a day to get used to playing at that level. But Drezet says having two Prince George teams playing for medals in the end, says a lot about the strength of high school volleyball in the area.

“I don’t think Prince George, including College Heights, gets the respect we deserve across the province a lot of times,” said Drezet, an assistant to head coach Colin Carson. “This has been pretty steady – every year there’s a Prince George team in the final or the top four and this year we had two in the top four and that says a lot about how good the athletes are and how good the coaches are doing in P.G.”

Meanwhile in Vancouver at the triple A girls provincial championship, the Kelly Road Roadrunners, coached by Erika Morris and Mackenzie Bouchard, lost 2-0 (25-17, 25-21) to the Langley Saints in the ninthplace playoff Saturday. Crofton House of Vancouver posted a three-set win over Timberline of Campbell River in the championship match Saturday.

In the girls double-A provincial championship in Vanderhoof, the College Heights Cougars, coached by Jason Olexyn, defeated Brentwood of Victoria in straight sets (2523, 25-19) to finish 11th. Langley Christian beat St. Thomas More of Burnaby in the gold-medal match.