Kingston, ON, Sunday, October 16, 2011. The UNB Varsity Reds finished off the eight-team “Coast-to-Coast” tournament in fourth place, after a 3-0 loss to the Calgary Dinos in Sunday’s bronze medal game at Queen’s University. Set scores were 20-25, 21-25, 22-25. Fourth-year setter, Andrew Costa (Summerside, PE), received the “Player of the Game” for UNB, while fifth-year setter, Jay Blankenau (Sherwood Park, AB), took home the honours for Calgary.
The Varsity Reds gave the CIS ’09-’10 National Champions and ’10-’11 silver medalists a good battle, forcing the Dinos to have to regroup late in each set. The third was a bit of a heartbreaker for VReds, however, as they jumped out to leads of 8-3 and 16-11 before allowing the Dinos to tie it at 16-16. The Dinos would take a 24-18 lead late in the set, but UNB would storm back to 22-24 with aggressive serving and solid blocking. On the next play, Calgary would get a break as UNB’s Brett LeDrew (Clarenville, NF) narrowly missed another block, giving the Dinos the match.
Varsity Reds outside hitter, Julio Fernandez (Los Teques, Venezuela), led all attackers with 14 kills. His impressive play throughout the weekend earned him a spot on the tournament “All-Star” team.
COACH’S COMMENTS
“This was a great experience for our team. We had the opportunity to play three top ranked teams in the country in a CIS Nationals format, at the venue that will host the ’11-’12 CIS Championships. The other seven teams in the tournament had already played 7 or 8 matches, so this weekend allowed us to improve in a lot of the areas we needed to. I was very happy with how our setting improved in each match, which will be key for us in the week’s ahead. Julio also had a great weekend for us, but perhaps the most pleasant surprise was the play of Brett LeDrew, who added another dimension for us in the middle. We’ll now set our sights on the first Interlock of the regular season in Montreal in two weeks.”
Final Standings:
1. Alberta
2. UBC
3. Calgary
4. UNB
5. Western
6. McMaster
7. Queen’s
8. Montreal
Tournament All-Stars:
Alberta - #1 Jarron Mueller
Calgary - #9 Jay Blankenau
Calgary - #11 Andrew Visser
UNB - #5 Julio Fernandez
UBC - #5 Milan Nikic
UBC - #10 Chris Klassen
Tournament MVP - Alberta #13 Mitch Irvine