The Island’s pedigree in volleyball in represented by a notable list of Olympians, from Greg Russell and Fred Winters to Martin Reader and Jamie Broder, and national championships at the college level. The latter seasons start up again this week with the Camosun College Chargers, the defending Canadian Colleges Athletic Association national men’s champions and the Vancouver Island University Mariners, the four-time defending CCAA national women’s champions.
It is one of the great Island sporting derbies and will be renewed when the Chargers and Mariners open 2022-23 Pacwest conference play Friday at VIU in Nanaimo and Saturday at PISE gym on the Camosun Interurban campus with the women’s games at 6 p.m. and men’s contests at 8 p.m. and national-championship banners being raised both nights.
The men’s games will be a reprise of last season’s Pacwest playoff final in which the Chargers rallied for a five-set upset victory to upend the nationally top-ranked Mariners. Upstart Camosun went on to a national title run in Quebec City that capped, with a glorious bang, former national-team captain Charles Parkinson’s 13-season tenure as Chargers head coach.
“This is the kind of exit everybody dreams about and it came true for me,” at the time said Parkinson, who provided the colour commentary for CBC at six consecutive Summer Olympics from Atlanta 1996 to Rio 2016.
Taking over as Camosun men’s head coach from Parkinson, who retired with two nationals titles, is former Douglas College Royals and Volleyball sa国际传媒 national excellence program assistant coach Kelvin Ma.
“This will be an exciting season with a brand new coaching staff leading the way with nine returning athletes from the national championship team in 2021-22,” Ma said in a statement.
“Playing alongside them will be eight rookies who are ready to compete in the Pacwest. With a healthy mix of experienced players and eager rookies, you can expect to see a variety of line ups competing throughout the season.”
Chargers star Vitor Pereira, national tournament MVP last season, has graduated with a degree in business administration but fellow-Brazilian Eduardo Bida, who was named to the national tournament first all-star team last season, returns to captain the Chargers along with fellow fifth-year veteran Brendan Folkerts.
The VIU women’s “Drive for Five” national crowns will come through its own gym with coach Shane Hyde’s Mariners hosting the 2023 CCAA national championship tournament March 8-11. The Mariners are led by star Ukranian-import Yevgeniya Lytvynenko, who went through plenty last season in being named 2022 national tournament MVP, while raising money through GoFundMe for her refugee sister and nephew and niece.
The Camosun women’s team is carried by fifth-year Corrine McNeice and fourth-years Hannah May, Chantell Dobie and Brooke Ure.
