Vernon Sky Black U14 Boys won silver at the Tier 1, Division 1 Volleyball provincial finals at the Tradex in Abbotsford.
Sky Black, coached by Richard Bedard, came second in their pool on opening day. Vernon defeated Focus Crush of Burnaby 25-14, 9-25, 15-9, Element of Delta 25-16, 25-27 and lost a set to Victoria Black 25-14, 25-21. This set them up for their first playoff match, which they won two straight, 25-15, 25-20, against Victoria Red.
The second day was playoffs among the top eight teams.
Vernon defeated Air Attack Gold of Richmond 25-9, 26-28, 15-7 to get them into the semi-finals, which proved to be their most exciting match of the tournament, against Force of Surrey. The first line lost unexpectedly 23-25, yet the second line played with a lot of heart and determination to win 25-23. This set them up to put in their most solid line and they won 15-10 in a hard fought match.
In the gold match, they had another chance to beat Victoria Black, the 2016 U13 champions. Although they won the first game 25-20, they lost the next two 19-25 and 11-15.
“Our guys expended so much energy in the semi-final that there wasn’t much left in the tank for the final,” said Bedard. “We didn’t have a break between the matches. Jacob Defeo had to play every game since halfway through our quarterfinal due to Ty Louis (middle) getting injured. He played lights-out volleyball for the team, yet was exhausted like the other boys. They have nothing to hang their heads about though. Many were talking about the strength of our team and what a great weekend we had.”
The Sky Black team members are Jake Bartels, Ronan Bedard, Blake deLange, Defeo, Joshua Hall, Louis, Dayson Romain, Carter Scott, Drayson Truscott-Plitt, Levi Vanderdeen, Carter Vanderleest, Cody Wessels, and assistant coach Karen Bedard.