Spirits Conjure Up Five Set Victory

To a loud and large crowd the Vanier Spirits senior girls volleyball team managed to stir up a 3 - 2 sets victory over the visiting Peacock Toilers on Thursday evening.

Starting later than the scheduled 8 pm time due to the length of the senior boys matchup the girls game was no less exciting.

It was a matchup where the sets went down to the last rallies with the wiry Toilers - cheered on by a loud contingent of Peacock Tornadoes football players - not conceding anything.

The third and fourth sets were drawn out battles that were decided at the wire.

The game went 3 - 2 in the Spirits favour with the set scores Vanier 15 - Peacock 25, Vanier 25 - Peacock 14, Vanier 22 - Peacock 25, Vanier 25 - Peacock 23 and Vanier 15 - Peacock 6.

Vanier Spirits head coach Aly Bell was up on Thursday night’s game.

“It was awesome. It was a lot of fun to watch. The girls had a great time playing Peacock. They are a great team with a lot of great athletes and it was fun going to battle with them. It was fun just going back and forth with them,” Bell said.

She said the Peacock team and their abilities was no surprise to her.

“I knew the players coming in when they were younger. I knew they’d be really talented coming in here,” she said about the Toilers.

Asked about the “Polupski factor” (Peacock Toilers head coach Lorne Polupski known for being a volleyball strategist) Bell said it wasn’t a factor at all.

She said she was likewise good at volleyball strategy.

Both coaches took more than a few time outs during the game to strategize with the troops.

Bell said there were a lot of good things in the Spirits game.

“Our defence was awesome…our girls really fought they never gave up. There were a lot of good things such as our serving and our hitting. Smart moves.”

She said she was looking for the Spirits to remain consistent.

“I hope we stay where we are. We remain undefeated but we’ve got a lot of good competition. Peacock is awesome. Central (Cyclones) have a good little team as well.”

This season’s city league in senior girls volleyball is said to be the most evenly balanced competitive wise in years.

“It’s awesome this year it’s a lot of fun.”

Peacock Toilers assistant coach Haylee Bevan said it was a great effort by her team in the five set battle.

“I thought it was amazing. I’m so excited the league this year is more even. It’s been fairly lopsided for the last few years. So we have a city league this year with fairly talented teams. So I thought the match was great,” Bevan said.

“We didn’t give up that was good,” she said about the Toilers effort on Thursday night.

A big move was in the fourth set where the Toilers came back to tie it 22 - 22. It’s nothing new for the Toilers.

“We’ve had a lot of games this year where we have come back from a fairly big deficit. So we never give up. We knew we were always in it so you tie it up to push (for the win),” Bevan said.

“It feels really good. We were just about there but couldn’t close it out.”

She is excited for the Toilers this season.

“I’m excited. We’ve got a really young team. We have quite a few grade tens on our team all of which are playing tonight against the best team last year in the city league championships,” Bevan said.

Leadership from the grade 11 and grade 12 players has been a key for the team.

Size wise Vanier has the advantage when it comes to height but she said the Toilers make up for it.

“No we’ve got. If blockers out there. We had numerous blocks tonight until the fifth set there. I think we did well in the first four sets…I’m very proud.”