At the beginning of the high school senior girls鈥� volleyball season, coach Scott Millington and his No.聽5 provincially ranked Oak Bay Breakers established a challenging goal for the 2015 campaign. 鈥淭he whole season, we鈥檙e trying to be in the final of every tournament we鈥檙e going to,鈥� said Millington, whose troops are off to Seaquam Secondary this weekend for tournament play.
Recently, the Breakers finished second in both the Vancouver Island University Mariners鈥� and Camosun Chargers鈥� events.
Oak Bay was defeated by St. Thomas More at VIU and by Riverside at Camosun, both in three sets. The latter setback dropped the Breakers from the No. 4 seed in sa国际传媒 to No. 5.
鈥淚t鈥檚 the highest Oak Bay has ever been ranked 鈥� the girls鈥� team, at least,鈥� said Millington whose club also recently wrapped up the first round-robin portion of Lower Island league play. The Breakers went undefeated at 8-0, dropping just one set of those best-of-three local matchups to Mount Douglas in the second game of year.
The most recent league wins came Tuesday with 2-0 sweeps of Claremont and Pacific Christian.
It鈥檚 not like the Breakers haven鈥檛 been pushed, however, forced to pull out 2-1 victories over Mount Douglas and Belmont in tournament action. 鈥淭hey鈥檝e both improved since the start of the year. Kudos to them, but we managed to squeak those out,鈥� said Millington. 鈥淭he girls are excited. We have a lot of Grade 11s this year, so it鈥檚 a pretty new team, so fourth or fifth place in the provincial rankings is pretty good. But we want to be in that final at provincials.鈥�
That season-ending tournament, featuring the 16 best quadruple-A teams, will be at Dover Bay from Dec. 3-5. The Island championship is Nov. 20-21 at Belmont.
But much more lies ahead for the Breakers, including this weekend鈥檚 tournament, before they move into league play, beginning Tuesday at Mount Douglas along with St. Michaels University School, Belmont, Stellys and Spectrum.
The Breakers are led by national junior team player Thana Fayad, an outstanding outside hitter.
鈥淎t present, Oak Bay looks like a program that will contend in every event,鈥� said Camosun head coach Chris Dahl. 鈥淭hey have a lot of young talent and, of course, Thana Fayad is a special player. You don鈥檛 have the opportunity to see many like her over the years, so I hope the locals take the time to follow the Victoria high school scene.鈥�
There is much more to the Breakers鈥� team, however. 鈥淓veryone thinks we just set to Thana,鈥� said Millington. 鈥淏ut we have Erin Mutch [Grade 10], who is a good hitter as well and we have strong girls in the middle. A lot of people think we just set outside then, all of a sudden, they see our middles hit the ball real hard and they say, 鈥極h, oh, they have weapons inside, too.鈥� 鈥�
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