sa国际传媒
Outside-hitter Shanice Marcelle of Victoria and the Canadian women鈥檚 volleyball team did what they needed to keep the samba drums beating. Now it鈥檚 the turn of Canadian men鈥檚 team captain Fred Winters, also from Victoria.
Marcelle, out of Spectrum Community School and known for her surgical ball striking, did just enough to move on to the next stage of qualifying for the 2016 Rio Summer Olympics as sa国际传媒 placed fourth at the NORCECA women鈥檚 Continental championships in Morelia, Mexico.
Puerto Rico beat sa国际传媒 3-1 in the bronze-medal game Friday but both teams advanced, along with the gold-medallist U.S. and silver-medallist Dominican Republic, to the Olympic qualification tournament to be held in January.
Fifth-through-eighth-place Cuba, Mexico, Trinidad/Tobago and Costa Rica are out of luck for Rio and can began preparing for Tokyo 2020.
鈥淚 was hoping for a bit more . . . [but] achieving our minimum goal of qualifying to the Final Four is a big step in the right direction,鈥� Canadian head coach Arnd Ludwig said in a statement.
The men鈥檚 NORCECA tournament begins this week in Mexico, with the top-four national teams advancing to the Olympic qualifier at a date and venue to be determined. sa国际传媒 opens Monday against Honduras.
sa国际传媒, captained by Winters out of Claremont Secondary, draws a break because the U.S. won鈥檛 be playing. The Americans were among the top-two teams in the recent World Cup in Japan and qualified directly for the Rio Olympics. sa国际传媒 was seventh in the World Cup, which should leave it in good stead for this NORCECA qualifier in Mexico.
鈥淲e learned a lot from the World Cup experience and had the opportunity to play the best teams in the world,鈥� Canadian head coach Glenn Hoag said in a statement.
鈥淣ow our task is to have a successful tournament at the NORCECA Championships and move forward to the Olympic qualification tournament. We don鈥檛 take anything for granted. We will face each match with the same goal in mind 鈥� Rio 2016.鈥�
sa国际传媒 has not qualified for the Olympics in men鈥檚 volleyball since Barcelona in 1992. Winters and Oak Bay High grad Josh Howatson came within a game of getting to London 2012 but lost the qualifying final to the U.S. in Long Beach, California.
Winters, who began playing for the Victoria Volleyball Association at 15, is 33 and this is likely his last chance.
Meanwhile, sa国际传媒 looks well positioned for ample representation at Rio 2016 in women鈥檚 beach volleyball with two of the current top-six ranked teams in the world.
Claremont-grad Jamie Broder of Victoria and partner Kristana Valjas from Toronto are world No. 6 with 4,286 FIVB points. Ontario players Heather Bansley and Sarah Pavan are world No. 3 with 5,070 points. Agatha Bednarczuk and Barbara Seixas of Brazil lead with 6,350 points.
