Golden Eagles top junior and senior ranks
The Thorold Golden Eagles senior boys volleyball team defeated the Grimsby Eagles to win the Zone 4 NRHSAA AA championship.
Coming out of the pandemic pause, Jennifer Barker didn’t know what to expect from the Thorold Golden Eagles senior boys volleyball team.
“We are a fairly young team with only four experienced Grade 12 players (Maxsym Dmytryshyn, Matthew Wing, Nicholas Gambell and Jacob Brisebois) so I wasn’t sure how the season would go,” the Thorold head coach said. “We have missed a year and a half of sports and I only had one club player so we had a lot of work to do.”
Things became more unsettled when middle blocker and co-captain Wing was injured for most of the season.
“It meant the Grade 11s had to step up to fill his void,” she said, a few days after her team won the Niagara Region High School Athletic Association Zone 4 AA title.
“In term of whether I thought we could win (zone), maybe not in the beginning because we had a lot of work to do, but certainly as we were gaining momentum I thought OK. We can do this.”
One thing that altered Thorold’s expectations and hopes was seeing Eden moving to the AAA level from the AA level because of an increase in school population at the volleyball factory. The Flyers have won 15 straight medals at the Ontario Federation of School Athletic Associations’ AA level, including gold in 2019.
“With Sir Winston Churchill and Eden battling it out for AA, it opened the door for us against Grimsby for AA,” Barker said.
Thorold beat Grimsby 3-1 Oct. 27 and 3-1 Nov. 3 in league play to earn the right to host the zone final.
“We had to beat Grimsby again and sometimes it is hard to beat a team three times in one season,” Barker said.
But the Eagles did not disappoint their head coach, capturing the zone championship with a 3-0 (25-23, 25-17 and 25-17) victory.
“It has been a long time since the senior boys won (zone) but we have been successful at the junior level. It is making that leap up at the senior level when you are no longer a single A team,” Barker said.
There was no secret to the team’s success.
“It was their commitment, they support each other and they stay pretty calm on the court,” she said. “This is, by far, the nicest collective team as a group that I have ever coached. They work hard, they attend every early morning practice and they are just a great group of kids.”
Dmytryshyn mentioned a few other factors for the team’s excellent performance.
“Our chemistry has been really great and we have developed so much better than we expected to. By the end of the season, we have just been incredible.”
Barker felt the (BPSN not TSN) turning point for her team was a 3-1 (25-19, 23-25, 25-6 and 25-11) loss to powerhouse Eden Oct. 29.
“It was nice that we were competitive against Eden. We lost 25-19 against their starters so that was great and we beat their bench,” she said. “That was a great confidence boost for us considering they probably still had more than one club player on the court. It was nice that their coach said how scrappy we were and we are scrappy. We will get to balls that people don’t expect us to get to with a chicken wing, or foot or whatnot.”
Team captain Dmytryshyn agreed the Eden game was huge for Thorold.
“It is such a big and reputable team and we took a set off of them. It really brought up our confidence level and we have been playing better even since then.”
Dmytryshyn has played a key role for Thorold volleyball since he arrived at the school.
“He is our one club player and I call him Mr. OVA because when he came in in Grade 9, he was just a dynamite volleyball player,” Barker said. “He has really grown as a leader, he is our captain, he is great at tweaking things on the court and obviously his skill is great. He is definitely a two-way player for us.”
The Niagara Rapids travel player has enjoyed his role as a team leader
“I love it,” the 17-year-old St. Catharines resident said. “It grows my character and it helps me show other people what to do. We only have one official coach so being in the gym with an extra sets of hands and eyes can help that way as well.”
The Rapids’ libero also loves the chance to be a hitter for his high school team.
“It allows me to show off a little but more and it brings out motivation for the team. And honestly, it is just a blast.”
He is excited about competing at the Southern Ontario Secondary Schools Association championships Thursday at E.L. Crossley.
“It is totally awesome and it is something that we have been working towards to all season. I have been looking forward to it since Grade 9.”
Other members of the championship team, coached by Barker and former players Connor and Rylie Gambell, were Elijah Cosby, Hunter Fluellon, Aaron Kennedy, Deacon Martineau, Owain McNeil, Nathan Miller, Keenan Poulouski, Jazil Sheikh, Maxwell Steele, Nolan Tanham, Isaac Walker and Nicholas Wuhlar.
Thorold’s junior team also won the Zone 4 title this year which bodes well for the future of the program.
“Moving forward, we are looking at building upon the success of the juniors,” Barker said.
The junior and senior teams work together.
“Kelly (Pendakis) and I work well together,” Barker said. “We have been coaching for 25-plus years and sometimes we do practices together. It is a good partnership.”
The Thorold Golden Eagles junior boys volleyball team defeated the Governor Simcoe Redcoats to win the Zone 4 NRHSAA A championship.
The Thorold Golden Eagles junior boys volleyball team captured the NRHSAA Zone 4 A title with a come-from-behind road victory over the first-place Governor Simcoe Redcoats.
Thorold lost the first two sets 25-15 and 25-17 before rallying to win the match with 25-19, 25-20 and 15-9 victories.
“Our boys never gave up,” coach Julie Wiersma said. “They kept playing and chipping away to take the win.”
Second-place Thorold finished the regular season with a 4-3 record and advanced to the final by defeating the Smithville Christian Storm 3-0 in the semifinals.
“We didn’t have any expectations going into the season,” Wiersma said. “We had a good turnout for tryouts and narrowed the team down to 12 athletes (four Grade 10s and eight Grade 9s). The boys were awesome about attending practice and worked hard to improve their skills
Wierma and Keli Pendakis enjoyed coaching the team.
“We have a great group of boys who love to practice and work together as a team. They would practice every day after school if they could.”
Making up the championship roster were Yousef Toulan, Tyler Rowland, Brandon Dale-Servos, Spencer Fluellon, Jack Drummond, Connor Bolibruck, Will Sargeant, Kai Netzke, Rowan Squire, Tayte Fraser, Stefan Dmytryshyn and Wyatt Colquhoun.
