As defending provincial champions, the Prince George Kodiaks didn’t live up to their top billing a month ago at the U-18 boys B.C. club volleyball championships in Richmond, but that’s ancient history now.
They’ve got a shot at national glory starting Sunday at the Volleyball Canada Nationals in Edmonton, however, the Kodiaks’ path to the medal round of the 32-team Division 1 tournament is not going to be easy.
The Kodiaks are seeded fourth in the A Pool with Ubuntu (the top-ranked team from Ontario), 204 U18 gold (Manitoba’s No. 3 seed) and Bounce (Ontario No. 3).
“I’m super stoked, this is a good team and I think we’re progressively getting better and I think we have what it takes to come out on top in our division,” said Kodiaks right-side hitter Jordan Fulljames, who played high school volleyball at College Heights, along with Kodiaks teammate Eli Woldringh. “Our energy just needs to stay high and we need to do what we do best.”
The Kodiaks went to Kelowna a couple weekends ago for playday against the 18U Heat and that gave everybody an abundance of court time to tune up for what they’re up against this weekend in Edmonton.
The Kodiaks started well at provincials, winning all three preliminary matches, but went 2-2 in the playoff round, dropping a 2-0 quarterfinal decision to the Seaside Six Pack of South Surrey/White Rock, which dropped them out of medal contention. The Kodiaks went on to finish sixth.
“We’ve got a lot of depth,” said Kodiaks assistant coach Jason Olexyn. “Once in a while we slip up, like we did at provincials in the quarterfinals. We went 4-2 but just lost the wrong match.
“We’ve got a lot of hardworkers out there and some big hitters and some great blocking but it just didn’t come together at provincials. Due to COVID they didn’t have provincials two years in a row and three years ago they won provincials (as a 15U team), so there were a lot of high expectations on us going down to provincials to live up to that and we came up short.”
This is their last hurrah as a club team. With high school graduation only about a month away, five of the Kodiaks have been recruited to play for college or university teams.
“I’m pretty nervous actually,” said Fulljames. “It’s a big world after this and I’m gong to go play at Camosun College, so I’m continuing, and so are a lot of our guys.
“I picked up volleyball in Grade 8 and just ran with it ever since then. Club volleyball is after our school season and it just gives a chance to collectively have the best players in Prince George.”
Kodiaks setter Chris Zimmerman, the MVP in the provincial double-A championship, has been recruited to play at Queens University in Toronto, while power hitters Tony Kibonge and Brandon Steel will be delivering spikes and digs at Grande Prairie Regional College next season. Woldringh, who played for Team B.C. with Zimmerman and Fulljames, is taking his talents to the Pacific Western Athletic Association at Douglas College in North Vancouver.
Kibonge, a dual sport star in volleyball and basketball at Cedars Christian who helped the Eagles win provincial bronze in both sports this season, is looking forward to making one more championship run. With volleyball club nationals cancelled the previous two seasons because of the pandemic he’s never played in a national event.
“I think it’s gong to be a great experience because its all over Canada and it’s probably the biggest tournament I’ve ever been to,” said Kibonge, who plans to study kinesiology. “I’ve only been to provincials and it’ll be pretty fun to see that.
“I’m super-excited and I think we could do pretty well. We have a pretty great offence, even though we’re pretty short, our tallest guy (setter Zimmerman) is six-foot-three, we’re still able to compete with the better teams because of our athleticism.”
The 18U Kodiaks have been sharpening their skills in games against the 17U boys, who also placed sixth at provincials.
“They have a pretty good team and it’s nice we have somebody we can actually play against,” said Kibonge. “Some teams don’t have that and when they get into games it’s a bit of a surprise because they’ve only been doing drills.”
The other players on the 18U boys squad are John Jeong, Colby Hoy, Raiden Aimetz, Duncan Fisher, Judah Keryluik, Jacob Hoskins and Ryan Danbrook. Dan Drezet is the head coach and Jacob Tiani is the other assistant coach.
The national tournament starts Thursday for the 15U and 17U divisions, with five Prince George Volleyball Club teams entered, including the boys U17 and U15 red teams and girls 17U and 15U Red squads. Those tournaments wrap up Saturday.
The 18U and 16U national tournaments will be played Sunday-Tuesday in Edmonton. Prince George has two 16U girls teams entered, Red and Black, and one 16U boys team, Kodiaks Red.
The U-18 girls Kodiaks Red were not at their best at the provincial tournament in Richmond, finishing seventh, which knocked them into Division 2 at nationals. But they’re thrilled about getting a chance to face teams from all over Canada for one last tournament together.
“(Finishing seventh in B.C.) was not the result we were hoping for, every team in the top-10 was really good and we came across the eventual provincial champions (Momentum of Victoria) in our quarterfinal match and they were a little too much for us,” said head coach Jasen Florell.
“We were the first B.C. team not in Division 1, which we were kind of disappointed with, because we were hoping to compete against the best teams in the country. Alberta No. 7 is good enough to get in there but B.C. No. 7 isn’t, so we’re stuck where we ae but that’s OK.
“We’re going to compete and have fun. It’s our last time together with this group, we’ve been together four or five years and it’s going to be fun and emotional.”
Four team members are heading to post-secondary teams next season, including power hitters Macyn Under (Simon Fraser University) and Shadae Black (Douglas College) and middle blockers Quinlan Shaw-Bowers and Harsh Dhaliwal (both Grande Prairie Regional College). Shaw-Bowers suffered a knee injury at the provincial tournament and won’t play at nationals.
The 18U girls roster also includes Carly Gurney, Hayden Bedard, Evelyn Risdale, Kaleena Samaai, Breanna Day, Payton Holyk, Madison Florell, Avery Parker and Brooklyn Van Camp. Mark Gurney is the assistant coach.
