Bulldogs content with silver
The Sir Winston Churchill Bulldogs have no regrets after earning a silver medal at the Ontario Federation of School Athletic Associations AAA volleyball tournament in Toronto.
The No. 8 ranked Bulldogs dropped a 17-25, 25-15, 23-25, 20-25 decision to No. 1 ranked Oakridge in the gold medal game. It’s the second OFSAA silver medal in three years for the Bulldogs, who also placed second in 2017.
“The whole time our goal was a medal,” Sir Winston coach Brent Mergl said. “We truly believed we were going to get a medal at OFSAA. There was never a doubt through the season based on who we were playing and how we were playing.
“Everybody was committed for gold. We just came up a little short.”
Mergl said there was no shame in losing to Oakridge.
“If we played those guys 10 times, we might win twice,” he said. “They’re a very good team. That’s why they were the No. 1 seed and for us to get a silver medal, I’m extremely happy with the kids.”
Mergl said the Bulldogs did manage to knock off Oakridge in pool play earlier this season at a tournament before losing to them in the final.
“We knew their strengths, we knew their weaknesses,” he said. “We had to play almost mistake-free and sometimes that’s hard to do, especially coming off a five-set match being really tiring.”
The Bulldogs battled back to defeat Mississauga in the semifinals 25-20, 21-25, 19-25, 25-22, 15-1 to advance to the gold medal game.
The Bulldogs topped their pool with a 3-1 record with wins over St. Marcellinus 25-19, 29-27, Oakville Trafalgar 29-27, 25-20 and Harbord 25-11, 25-9 while losing to Upper Canada College 24-26, 25-23, 11-15. Sir Winston then knocked off Pierre E. Trudeau High School in the quarter-finals 25-20, 25-23, 11-25, 25-18.
Mergl admitted playing so many games against top-notch competition took its toll.
“We have to work extremely hard for every point,” he said. “We had a tougher draw coming through. We had to play a lot of good teams to make it to the finals.
“We were in tough making it all the way through there.”
Team members are: Nathan Butler, Noah Crawford, Andrew Donato, Spencer Gregson, Jaydon Hoadley, Mathew Jeffery, Quinn McInnis, Randy Phelan, Brady Pupek, Alejandro Ruiz Rivas, Andrew Song, Cole Spagnuolo, Dylan Vanleeuwen, Alexander Wang and Griffin Whitehorne.
Mergl was assisted by Garrett Goodbrand and Tammy Short.
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