One year ago, Lynus Wong & Dion Thompson were a new developing beach pair selected to represent NSW in the u17 Australian Junior Beach Volleyball Championships (AJBVC). They decided to join our 2014 UTS Junior Indoor Program and by attending weekly training at RMSH, quickly adapted their beach skills to the indoor game. Lynus & Dion travelled to Adelaide in January 2014 for their first appearance at a national championship in blistering heat conditions. They were part of the UTS Junior squad for the remainder of 2014 and played in SVL and numerous tournaments including Canberra Good Neighbour. Over the 2014/2015 Summer, Lynus & Dion focused on their beach training and played in various local beach tournaments. Their hard work paid off in early 2015, when they were selected to again represent NSW in the u19 Beach Squad. After months of preparations on the sand, they returned to Adelaide in April 2015 for their 2nd appearance at the AJBVC. Here is their story…
Lynus & Dion in action on the sand in Adelaide at AJBVC 2015 (Photo by Owen Hammond)
AJBVC Adelaide 2015 (by Lynus & Dion)
DAY ONE: After we had all settled in and had a hit at the South Australian Sports Institute (SASI) the day before, we were well rested and mentally prepared for the exciting day ahead of us. There was no more time to prepare; all we could do is play our very best and hope that the efforts of our training would show. 06:30 was the planned breakfast time for everyone; we ended up being awoken early because Marcos still had his watch on Sydney time (half an hour later than Adelaide time). Begrudgingly, we all awoke to eat so we would have our strength for the big day. We left in three separate vans and made our way to the beach for an 08:30 start for some teams. Once our feet had begun to warm up to the cold, soft sand of Glenelg beach we were already getting our serving arms ready on empty courts. Unfortunately, Lynus and I were getting prepared and getting in the zone for our games ahead so we did not get to spend a lot of time seeing what the other teams were getting up to. Our first game was at 09:50 and we wanted to start out strong as it would be the first game for our opponents, so we planned to bring to the court what they wouldn’t have: intensity. Our excitement was soon dampened however as the WA team we were going to play against forfeited due to one of them feeling sick. With one ‘win’ under our belts we reluctantly did the duty we were scheduled for and decided to keep our thoughts on ‘bringing the fire’ to the next game. We were then up against another WA team, this one however, was familiar from last year. Lewington and Hunt were our opponents and were played hard but in the end it was a win for WA. After some much needed lunch, we headed out to play our next game against QLD. This was an interesting game as we had never seen this team play up until now. So we had to be on our toes when it came to analysing their game technique. We didn’t have enough time to combat their style and we went home that day with 1 win technically, but we felt a little disheartened. After a cool down session with Roger, we switched off to get ready for our games against SA and VIC, two tough teams.
DAY TWO: As our first game was at 11:10 we got to have a slight sleep in and have breakfast at 07:00. After we filled our stomachs our morning was spent scouting the strengths and weaknesses of the teams we would be up against later and supporting the other NSW teams. Our game came around soon enough and we played our hardest but SA took the win due to their experience and height. But Lynus and I came away with a lot of great tips from our dedicated coach; Roger Jones. We knew what small things we needed to tweak and what things were just out of our control. We took these tips to our next game, and although we felt a little disheartened as we prepared to play against our hardest team yet. This VIC team had one thing that we didn’t and that was height. Lynus still valiantly did the best blocking he could on such as a big team. He managed to read that they liked rolling line and peeled off to pick-up some great balls. Even though we lost, we felt that we played well. We then had another cool down session with Roger and that was it for day 2.
DAY THREE & FOUR: The pool play was over and gladly all the NSW teams had made it to the next round. However there was still a challenge to go as the first game we were to face Queensland’s top seed Ferguson and Poland which eventually won the U19 category. The first game on day 3 ended with a loss to Queensland 21-15, 21-10. Game 2 of day 3 was unfortunately also a loss to WA’s Chamberlain and Haddress in a tight match of 21-15, 22-20. Coming an overall equal 13th out of 18, we worked hard and played well although we didn’t achieve the result we wanted however it was a magnificent experience to return to Adelaide for a national tournament. The return was like a test to find out how much we improved in a years’ time and the results were very satisfying to find the improvement was quite drastic. A year before me and Dion had only played beach volleyball and we began to play at UTS last season and through many weekly trainings our skills became more evident. A lot of things we learn in indoor we cannot learn as fast in beach. Just a lot a variables we can control in indoor that we can’t in beach like wind, sets, sun, and most importantly rain. Having the best court to train (RMSH) and coaches in UTS (and the fact that it was the closest access to school and home) meant that we had the best possible and efficient trainings.
Thankyou to the UTS Volleyball Club, our Beach Coaches, Roger Jones and our NSW Head Coach Nam Pham.
A smaller group of 4 teams headed over to Warriewood for the 2015 Manly State Cup on 11/12 April.
In the honours competition we were represented by a combined Honours & Div 1 team, and in the Division competition we were represented by a mens Div1/2 team, and a junior boys team. In the womens division 1 competition we had a womens Div 1/2 team.
Mens Honours (from Morky)
In what looked like the team of the century, UTS entered an honours team into Manly cup with a combined 340 years of volleyball experience – 75% of that in Andrew Lyell and Myself! Somehow the team of 10 had shrunk to 8, then to 6 and finally to 4 by the start of the first game. Having retired from volleyball over 5 years ago to take up coaching, I found myself on the wrong side of the lines, and on the court virtually all weekend. Half way through warm-up for our first game, it became evident that no one else was showing up and I quickly roped in an amazing middle in George Jigalin, defensive specialist Alberto Flamigni, current best female player in the country in Yoshi Ueda as well as donning the black jersey myself. The beautiful hands of Douglas Skinner did the majority of the setting, all the left handed hitting and majority of net touches was left to Yujun Lai. The best finger passing this decade and some solid outside hitting was performed by Josh Moll (fresh out of juniors), and Fillipe Ramos added some south American flair and solid all round game. Andrew Lyell joined the team late on Saturday, adding more than double the volleyball experience as the rest of the team combined, and Yoshi Ueda dream of being a boy and playing men’s volleyball came true (apart from the being a boy bit). The other teams competing had virtually their full honours teams playing, meaning the competition was going to be tough for the undermanned UTS team. Boasting just two honours players in Doug Skinner (setting) and Andrew Lyell (usually libero, but playing middle, setter or opposite) the odds were stacked against us. Fillipe, Josh and Yujun were all playing their first honours games and I had to play middle for most of the weekend – something I hadn’t done since 1995 when I still had body parts that worked and I could jump about 60 cm higher. Yoshi passed well and played some great defence and also increased the attractiveness of the team ten fold. The UTS team gave everyone a run for their money and came very close to causing several upsets, but unfortunately couldn’t hold on to their lead in any of the games and finished the tournament with a respectable fourth place finish. “We knew coming into the tournament we were undermanned, but we always believed we were good enough for a top four finish” said captain Doug Skinner in his post match interview. “Anything outside of the top 4 would have been unacceptable for us and also for our fans. Top 4 was our goal and we were pleased to have been able to achieve this.”
Yoshi keeping the guys in the game
Mens Division 1 (from Sucky)
Team: Haidang, Alberto, Pickles, Zach, Kel, Phil, Blair, Kris, Lee, Gino.
Giving some playing upwards opportunities to a few of the Div 1 team meant that our ranks were bolstered by a few of the Div 2 team. Which was good. Having a late start of the Saturday also mean a few players who were initially missing Sunday could make our first game. Also good. We started our first game against the ASIMS very positively and with some good play, took the first set. That was very good. Then we proceeded to play with a bit of complacency in the second set and ended up turning what looked like a good win, into a draw. That was bad. Our second game against Illawarra was as assistant coach Iggy put it “the team we wish we had all the time”. One guy shanks a pass upward and backwards and 5 people chase it off court. That sort of thing. That was very good. We won the game 2-nil and nearly added the third set. That was good. That was our Saturday. We then came back for an 8am game on Sunday against the Dragons. That was ok. They only had 4 players and forfeited the game. That was bad. With a couple of fill ins we made a fun game of it and got to work on a few things. That was good. Alberto did too much passing though. That was bad. This left us with 2 wins and a draw, but with one of the wins being a forfeit we were well set up to finish top of our pool. That was good. That was at 9am. Unfortunately we had to wait until 3pm for our next game. That was bad.
Our semi final was against a UNSW team that has previously won SVL so we knew we would be up against it. We played well and made it into the 20s in both sets. That was good. Blair was also not feeling well by now (and not suffering after effects from his birthday the night before) which put a dent in our offense. That was bad. Our Bronze medal game against Kaiata was a tough game with a slightly re-jigged line up. We had our moments during the game but couldn’t maintain a high enough level of play, eventually going down 2:0 and finishing fourth for the tournament. That was good.
Making the medal games among a big field was a great effort, and we had good contributions from everyone across the weekend. It was good.
Junior Boys (from Joseph)
This was the second major opportunity for the UTS Junior Boys to showcase their skill, this time in a much more demanding Division 1 Men competition. Once again we had some of our boys representing NSW at the beach volleyball nationals in Adelaide and others unavailable due to other school holiday commitments.
Day one had the team meet up at Northern Beaches Indoor Sports centre at 8:15am. This meant at least an hour travel for most players and even 5am wake-ups for some travelling from Regional NSW! The day began with a quick team meeting to establish a goal for the tournament, and to ready up the boys for what was certainly going to be an eventful tournament. Game 1 began at 9am against the USYD Yellow, this game was the first amongst a different UTS junior roster. Although there was much enthusiasm and some great hitting and defence from players Bruce Feng and Raymond Vaamaanuu, the junior boys ended up going down to the much bigger and older USYD Yellow. At the end of this first game, Mark Munter (UTS Mentor Coach) gave the boys some great feedback and tips for improving their game. Game 2 had the boys up against the BHV Colts, again an older team with a lot more experience playing in division 1. The game saw some great setting from Mathew Jigalin and exceptional passing from liberos Matt Rennie and Laymond Chu. It was clear in this game the difficulties of playing in division 1 men after the inevitable change up of the roster. Despite this, the boys were playing much better than the first game and were really beginning to play as a unit. Day 1 came to an end after duty at about 1pm.
Day 2 saw an even earlier start for the boys, this time at 7:30am! Having lost their coach and setter (George & Matt) due to Orthodox Easter, Laymond who was a libero the first day, bravely took to the setter position. Game 3 began at 8am against the Legends. This game saw exceptional service receive from players Joseph Phu and Hugh Catchpoole, resulting in some huge hits and some great setting by Laymond! Unfortunately for the boys, game 3 ended with a close loss to the Legends. Game 4 was the final game of the Manly Tournament for the boys. Going up against the Manly Bloom it was clear in this game the progress through the tournament truly had an effect on how the boys were becoming a team. Thanks to coaches Clara Loth and Alberto Flamigni, the boys rallied up for a great Placing Final. Throughout this last match, we had many huge blocks from middles Samuel Tifa and Sam Forbes, and even a complete shutout of the manly middle by player Joseph Phu! Although the boys were not as successful as their first tournament in Central Coast, it was clear that despite player changes the boys were definitely becoming more comfortable playing with each other. The division 1 experience will truly be helpful in the assembly of the Junior squad in preparation for SVL.
Special thanks go out to Coach Clara Loth for filling in the position of Main Coach. Thank you to George Jigalin and Mark Munter for their coaching on day 1 and thanks to Alberto Flamigni for helping the boys throughout day 2. Its great to see all the senior coaches helping the boys in the Junior Program, Thankyou!
Next Junior Tour …Newcastle State Cup #2!
28th & 29th March saw seven UTS teams travel a short distance north to the Central Coast. Most of the teams were using the chance to get some game time together having only started training together a couple of weeks ago. A great return from the event with UTS coming away with one gold, two silvers and one bronze, plus 2 4th places from the weekend.
Mens Honours – White (report from Morky)
UTS White Mens Honours made the trek to the Central Coast for the first tourney of the year. The seven games played were used as an extended training session to work on a new style of play and to incorporate new players.
Pretty boy Steve Lee was showing off his skills as setter and spent a lot less time over the
weekend with his shirt off than usual. He may nave been overshadowed (in more ways than
one) by newcomer, Matt Leete, who kept the female (and odd male) spectators entertained
with some big hits and with the removal of his shirt at the end of each game! The number of
(in particular) female spectators has increased dramatically since his inclusion into the team.
FWOAR! was a common expression used around the stadium, on the court and especially
after the game and in the boys change rooms.
Gregor Salvin, (sporting a new sculptured body that of a very white play dough, rolled
roughly into human form by a three year old) played a steady role as a passer hitter and
captained the team in the absence of Rob Fleury on Sunday. Rob, who captained the team on
Saturday, returned back to Sydney that night in preparation for watching New Zealand please 22 million Australians by being flogged in the World Cup cricket final. Libee, smashed lots of winners, overpassed lots of free balls, occasionally served the ball into court and constantly lit up the stadium with his infectious smile. Willis Choi, showed some awesome talent both in passing and in defence and proved why a libero should be on in backcourt, rather than a middle. James McRae looked like he may make it through a tournament without getting injured or breaking down but alas, it wasn’t to be. It only took three games before he was laying in the fetal position, with tears in his eyes, crying for his mamma. He did manage to play again though as well as a managing in to play at universal for a game and not looking like a complete spaz! Doug Skinner, played some of his best volleyball as setter, except for the games against the team he was coaching, where mysteriously they seemed to know every play he was running. Dan Gauci filled in for the team when needed and added some awesome firepower with both his serving and Spiking. In the course of 3 sets of volleyball played over the weekend, he amassed an amazing 612 points, beating the previous record by almost 600 points. Standin libero (for 1 game) and assistant coach, Morky, passed so many 3 point passes in his 1 game, that the statisticians awarded him amazing average of 4.0, to go with his 72 amazing ups. The 1 all scoreline at the end of the game did not reflect the amazingness of this performance, but coach Alberto Flamigni was heard to have said “it has to be one of the best performances ever ……. outside of Italy”. Coach Flamigni also managed the team well and gave a lot of valuable insight to the players. Unfortunately, without the aid a translator, none of this filtered down to the players, who were often seen nodding and shrugging their shoulders at the same time.
The team only lost one game in the double round Robin, having gone down to the experience of the Newcastle team. The same team went on to beat UTS in a closely contested final.
Silver Medals!
Womens Honours (Nam’s Team) – (report from Nam)
How to win a tournament…
-Stop touching the net Anna! Gosh.
-Buy a watch Bruna Polegato.
-Learn English Irina… or I need to learn Russian.
-Use the correct footwork to hit a pipe ball Alli (5,6,7,8…)
-Know the difference between a free ball, easy ball and down ball play Wendy
-For the 1000th time, get off the net Carrie… Are you awake?
-Use a 12 year old Libero.
-Most importantly… Set Lily at ball! Bam!
Awesome start to the year girls… It took us a little bit of time to get our rhythm but by the end of the tournament you played some awesome volleyball. Undefeated Champions! Well done everyone.
Cranky Panda.
Winners are Grinners!
Womens Honours (Dan’s Team) – (report from Daniel)
With a couple of new players and variations with the line ups, it was great to see the girls never give up and support each other throughout the weekend of State Cup Central Coast. It was different for these girls to play in the honours division as most of them were used to division 1 and others have not played in a state cup before, but they have proven they can be competitive and achieve results at that level. We started off strong beating UNSW in our first game which put the girls in a good state of mind. With being on a high from the first game we started to loose concentration easier and fell into a hole in the middle Saturday too loose both of our next 2 games against UTS Black and United. After a break and a little discussion with the girls we picked up our game to finish Saturday with a good win against UNSW for the second time. Sunday started slower with 2 quick losses again UTS Black and United again, but the fight was still in there eyes and the hunger for the win grew. To finish the day the girls made the bronze medal match and fought all the way till the end to win in the final set 15-9. It was an awesome finish to a good and long weekend. The progress was good and potential for these talented woman shows. Well done girls and let’s keep the fight going.
Listening to Coach Dan
Mens Division 1 – (report from Sucky)
Team: Haiding, Yujun, Blair, Phil, Fellipe, Pickles, Kel & Cillian, with guest appearances from Alberto, Darren & myself.
Our brand new team went to Central Coast hopeful but cautious. With so many new players in the team, the start (against a good Central Coast team) was always going to be a bit strange…and it was. After getting over that initial quiet though, we picked ourselves up and made a bit more of a game of it. Some big swings and some big blocks certainly helped. We stepped up for our second pool game and got away with the win against SW Khalsa. Our Sunday semi final was a close game. We won the first set, but then dropped the second. An incomplete third set left us a single point behind overall and relegated to the bronze playoff, but still a good game. Our Bronze medal playoff was against the Central Coast team who had beaten us on Saturday. We were much more aggressive and made a much better account of ourselves, but still went down 2:0.
A fourth place finish and a great start for 2015!
Big swing past a big block!
Womens Division 1 Cougars & Cubs – (report from Jenny)
A Tale of Two Days
A keen bunch of youthful volleyballers ventured to Gosford to take part in the first round of State Cup. Following a succesfull 2014, all things were looking good for a great start to the 2015 season.
Saturday saw the much anticipated return of Jess Ng to the team after a number of false starts the previous year. She joined Deb, Jo, Nardia, Haley, Jess, Cat and Jenny.
The three Saturday pool games saw the team make light work of the opposition winning against the Belles, UNSW and Central Coast. The first game of the year saw the team take the opportunity to put in a training run for the first 15 points or so, ensuring they ironed out as many shanks, dives and missed opportunities before pulling away convincingly. The second game was more consistent throughout with Jo even deciding she would throw in some head passes as things were going so well. The third game for the day saw Cat dominate the net with block after block keeping the game in our favour.
Following an early finish the team was in high spirits for the semis the following day.
And then came Sunday….
After watching the Honours teams do their stuff, the team commenced the semi against Manly with high expectations. Unfortunately the success of the day before didn’t transfer to the Sunday with strong serving and great defence from the opposition putting an end to the dominance of our middle attack and leading to a close but eventual defeat. The bronze playoff was a great deal closer going to 3 sets however with the same outcome as the previous match.
Despite the loses you would never have known as spirits remained high throughout and fun was had (as always) by all. Medal or no medal, the outcome for all playing was exactly the same! I guess the only way now is up…well not exactly but lets hope.
Cougars & Cubs waiting for the serve
Womens Division 2 (report from Ali)
This weekend was a great start for the div 2 women. We went on strong after having an early and the long drive Winning both games on Saturday which comfortably landed us first place in our pool and meant we finished at 12 on Saturday and didn’t start till 12 on Sunday (CHEERING)!
Maybe it was the late start on Sunday or we were tired from all the winning on Saturday but our semi against SNV went a tad sour after loosing on count back by 4 points, super annoying! However we were not going home empty handed so as our bronze medal match rolled around so did our energy and enthusiasm. Coach-less and support-less as the draws clashed we were our own cheer team ( the way it should be ) and we bought home the bronze comfortably taking down those blue bee stingers! We had great blocks from Guilana, Claire gave middle a go, Maddie and Katie’s defence was brilliant and Jali had some great plays through the middle. Wendy set the whole way round and made sure nothing hit the floor and the entire teams serving was on point. Well done girls A bronze for our first state cup – not a bad start at all!
Thanks Jali, Maddie, Katie, Wendy, Guilana and Claire for a brilliant weekend and bring on the rest of the season and thank you to Deb and Jess for being amazing coaches!
Enjoying the spoils of the weekend
Junior Boys (report from George & Clara)
This was our first opportunity to play with the new roster following the departure of several key players to the senior ranks and our recent selections trials. Some of our players had commitments to the NSW Beach Squad so we invited some of our new development players. We boarded the UTS Mini-Bus at RMSH Ultimo and met up with 3 of our regional players at the stadium in Terrigal. First up, the whole team (100%) attended a scoring clinic run by George Chalhoub from NSWVRA. George also went thru general tips for doing duty as well as what is expected from players on court and the behaviours/attitude to officials. A good start for our first time players 🙂 At this stage there is no Junior competition at our State Cups, so we entered our team into the Div 2 Open Mens Division. At the end of Day 1, we managed 2 wins against the Bumble Bees and 1 loss against the new look (big-hitting) Freezone team. A great result for our first day of volleyball as a new team and all players seemed to gel very quickly. In the evening at our team meeting I asked what was each players highlight and I was amazed by some of their responses: “Being part of such a tight/friendly team”, “We all supported each other”, “This is my first real tournament ever!”, “This was my first volleyball game in Australia!”, “This is my first time I am sleeping away from my family!” …OMG!!! On Day 2 we played our Semi Final and came out on fire, with a solid win. The Semi would end up being our best oncourt performance of the tournament, with lots of amazing plays, great defense/dives in back court, and some very aggressive/solid offence from both front and back court. The team were on a real high after the Semi, and went into the Gold Medal Final pumped. Although we played with a great attitude, the combination of the physical toll on everyone after a weekend of volleyball and a very solid performance by our opposition, meant we were outclassed overall and went down 0:2 to take out the Silver Medal. There were many highlights for our new team, including: running a solid back row attack consistently, some brilliant roof blocks and some amazing saves in defence, but the highlight was in the Gold Final, the opposition put up a 3 man block on our Opposite player, what the?… 3-man block in Div 2? Before I knew it, our own players started blocking them with our own 3 man block, much to my surprise because we had never trained for this, so full credit to the boys for giving it a go. The sense of team spirit and camaraderie was amazing all weekend and we look forward to working with a bunch of great juniors, willing to learn and be part of the UTS family. A big thank you to the Board of UTS-VC for supporting the Junior Program again this year and to all of the senior coaches who have provided assistance during the lead-up training sessions and to Jon Yaw for helping out when needed. We look forward to an exciting year of the Junior Program in 2015.
Central Coast Tournament Team Awards:
5 – Raymond Vaamanuu (Opposite) – ‘MVP: Most Valuable Player of the Tournament’ and ‘Best Abs’
7 – Samuel Tifa – ‘Off-court Hoodie Intimidator’ Award
9 – Joseph Phu (Universal) – ‘Best all-rounder’
10 – Dom Leo -‘Best Libero of the Tournament!’ Award
13 – Matthew Jigalin (Setter) – ‘Cool under pressure’ Award
15 – Noah Soderlund – ‘Quickest Middle’ Award
16 – Liam Fardell – ‘Team Energiser & Most Enthusiastic’ Award
17 – Bruce Feng (Passer/Hitter) – Best New Import’ and ‘Best Defense’
18 – Ryan Maginnity (Setter) – ‘Fish out of water’ Award, for playing as a passer/defender in the final
19 – Samuel Forsberg – ‘Best Rookie’ Award
20 – Michael Jones (Hitter) – ‘Best Development Player’ Award
Coaches: George Jigalin & Clara Loth
Enjoying the spoils, and they got a poster to stand with3. UTS Junior Boys bench in full support of the oncourt players for every point… great teamwork Boys!
Before you accept your selection into one of the representative teams at UTS Volleyball Club you should take a look at what you are signing up for. Included here is document with everything you would need to know on how to pay fees, understand your training commitments, get the coaches contact details, as well as see the various dates coming up. Lots of fun stuff to get into. Click on the link below to get the document.
After looking through the range of applications received, coaching appointments for UTS Volleyball club for 2015 can now be announced. Just in time for to try and impress them at the last few pre-season trainings before trials start.
Please note that these are subject to change following trials and final decisions on which teams UTS will field.
Thank you to all those who submitted an application.
Mens Honours – Black
– Head Coach: Cillian Bracken Conway
– Assistant Coach: Mark Munter
Mens Honours – White
– Head Coach: Alberto Flamigni
– Assistant Coach: Mark Munter
Womens Honours
– Head Coach: Nam Pham
– Assistant Coach: Yoshiko Ueda
Division 1 Men
– Head Coach: Keith Suckling
– Assistant Coach: Igor Mileusnic
Division 1 Women
– Head Coach: Daniel Gauci
– Assistant Coach: Irishka Penkina
Division 2 Women
– Head Coach: Debbie Chung
– Assistant Coach: Jess Reardon
Junior Boys
– Head Coach: George Jigalin
– Assistant Coach: Clara Loth
Dates have been set for open trials for the men’s & women’s senior (Honours and Divisions 1 & 2 teams) and junior UTS Volleyball representative teams.
The venues for these will be – Sydney Boys High School (SBHS), Cleveland St, Moore Park.
– Ross Milbourne Sports Hall (RMSH), UTS Broadway (formerly the Multi Purpose Sports Hall)
Dates for these trials are:
24th Feb – Junior Boys 6-8pm, SBSH
28th Feb – Junior Boys 2pm-5pm RMSH
3rd Mar – Open trials for Women 6:30pm – 8:30pm & Men 8:30pm-10:30pm SBSH
7th Mar – Men 3pm-6pm SBSH & Junior Boys 2pm-5pm RMSH
10th Mar – Open trials for Men 6:30pm – 8:30pm & Women 8:30pm-10:30pm SBSH
14th Mar – Junior Boys 2pm-5:30pm RMSH
17th Mar – Training begins.
Note: Juniors must be under 19 (ie. can’t be turning 19 in 2015)
Teams will play in primarily in State Volleyball League, but also State Cups and other tournaments.
Expected commitment of selected players includes attendance at weekly training sessions & payment of fees.
Please only attend if you are serious about playing for the UTS Volleyball in 2015.
Preseason training will start on Tuesday 3rd February from 6:30 onwards, Men and women together, for 3 weeks in the lead up to trails.
Expressions of interest for coaches for 2015 UTS Volleyball Club representative teams are now being invited. UTS Volleyball takes its coaching appointments very seriously and asks interested coaches to fill out and send through the application form as well as any other supporting documentation.
This Sunday 21st September will see a big weekend of Sydney Volleyball League Finals for the UTS Club. There is a chance for a gold medal in 5 divisions including both the premier divisons, with bronze medal chances for a further 5 teams.
In case you wanted to plan your day…
9am: The Under 19 women UTS Santa Sabina team 2 take on UNSW in the first Gold medal game of the day. UTS Santa Sabina 3 play SNVD in the Bronze Unde 19 womens game and UTS Santa Sabina 7 play in the Under 16s Bronze game.
10:30: The UTS Santa Sabina 6 Under 16 women take on UNSW in a Gold medal game. UTS Div 1 women take on Manly for Bronze in the Div 1 women, while UTS Mens Division 2 take on SSSCC in the Mens Division 2 Bronze final.
At around 12 noon the Juniors trophy presentation will occur.
12noon: The UTS Cougars & Cubs take on Dragons in the Womens Division 1 gold medal game. Also at that time the UTS Santa Sabina 1 team take on the UTS Division 2 women in the Bronze Medal Div 2 game.
2pm: The Mens Honours Black team take on UNSW in the Mens Honours gold medal final.
3:30pm: The Womens Honours team take on Manly in the gold medal final. This will be followed by the medal presentation and All Star announcements.
Judging by the intensity on display during the semi finals it is going to be a intense day with lots of great competition and skills on display.
See you out there!
Honours Women Semi Final (from Bruna)
After a disappointing loss against the Dragons the previous weekend, our team came back to the court with a new vibrant and competitive attitude, and ready to get the job done in ensuring our position into the Grand Final. After an intense match, the Dragons were defeated in 3 sets. Showing a strong team spirit and committing to a structured and technical volleyball we manage to win the game and enjoy ourselves in probably our best game during this season so far. Great work girls and Nam! And to the Gold medal match here we go!!
Leading into the coming 3 weekends of finals for SVL, lots of the UTS SVL teams find themselves in contention for medals. A quick summary for each division is below. Some recent game reports are below that as well.
Honours Men:
UTS Black have finished the season in first place following a tough win against UNSW in the final round game of the season. Black’s semi final opponent will be the winner out of Sydney Uni and UTS White from this coming Sunday. The White team stormed into contention following a very successful double header on Round 10 where they won both games.
Honours Women:
The Women’s Honours team have their last round game coming up before a a likely semi final encounter against Hills Dragons. The girls have previously won a 5 setter against this team, as well as a 4 setter, so they should be ready for a game.
Division 1 & 2 Men:
Artem’s Div 1 guys have found themselves in the lower part of the table this year and have been relegated into the Division 2 competition. This has put them up against George’s Division 2 team, which was one of the more exciting and loud games at SVL. While George’s team has their finals spot locked in, the Div 1 guys will need a good last week to make it into the Division 2 top four.
Division 1 Women:
The Cougars & Cubs and the Division 1 women both have quarter finals this weekend. The Cougars against SNV and Div 1 against UNSW. The Cougars will go in confident, having beaten SNV previously, while the Div 1 women will have to step up against a team that has beaten them previously. Wins for both would put them in opposite semi finals.
Division 2 Women:
Deb’s girls have shown great improvement over the year and currently find themselves in second place, just behind the UTS Santa Sabina team that was relegated down from Div 1. Hopefully they get a chance to meet in the gold medal final.
U19 Men:
The young guys team finds themselves 5th with one week to go. This will get them a quarterfinal, most likely against SNV, and a chance for a semi final.
U19 Women:
Santa Sabina 2 and 4 are in the top half of the ladder and looking forward to their finals, while Santa Sabina 3 is in the Plate.
U16 Women:
Santa Sabina 5 & 6 lead the table in this competition and can hopefully meet in the gold final after successful semi finals.
MATCH REPORTS
Honours Women vs UNSW Roundd 12 (from Missy)
The team went into this game keen to come out with a big win! Unfortunately losing the first set, 25-18, we realised this wasn’t going to be an easy game and had to pick up our game! Second set resulted in a win and 3rd had a smashing 25-12! It’s safe to say that was our best set, strong serves along with high and hard hits really threw UNSW out of their game. Fourth set was ridiculously close losing 26-24 yet we redeemed ourselves in the fifth set winning 15-12 (thank god). It was definitely a great feeling winning against UNSW after previously losing to them a few weeks prior. Overall we fought hard for the win, and went home happy chappys!
Week 8 of SVL saw byes for the Men’s Honours teams as well a Mens Divs 2 and the U19m….
In the men…
– Div1 lost 3:0 to EAG
In the women…
– Honours beat Manly 3:2
– Div 1 beat ISCV 3:1, then beat USYD 3:1
– UTSSS1 went down 3:0 to MWA
– 19W UTSSS2 won 3:0 against SNVD
– UTSSS3 lost 3:1 to UTSSS4
– UTSSS8 lost 3:0 to UNSW
Cougars & Cubs had a bye
Womens Div 1 (from Sucky) A double header for us meant we had a busy day… After a slow (or too early… depending on how you look at it) start we came back against ISCV after loosing the first set. Not great volleyball from us, but a win is a win.
After some quick lunch and a duty, our second game against USYD started much better. Although we dropped the second set, we played some really good volleyball in the 3rd and eventually won the game in 4.
Another couple of important games coming up for us next week with another double header… Good thing we love our volleyball!
Ornella getting it done on the outside
Women’s Honours (from Anna)
A quick recap of the last few weeks – We played Manly [for the second time in 3 weeks] and lost 3-0, Nam chucked a tanty and was seen storming out of the stadium, an awkward team silence followed and we all went home to wallow in our sadness. – We played Dragons [for the second time in 3 weeks] knowing we had to improve on our previous game. Our blocking significantly improved and Clara played some incredible defence for us to come out with the win 3-1, Nam even stayed for the final team chat!! Arriving at SVL today, no one seems to be able to explain why we are playing Manly for the 3rd time in 5 weeks?? I’m going to fast forward to set #3 as there is not much to be said about the first two, I was always taught by my wise mother “if you don’t have something nice to say, don’t say anything at all”. Down 2 sets, we knew we had to fight to get back into the game. With serve receive improving and finding the connection with the hitters, we began to play much more aggressively and really find the angles around the strong Manly block, with some great swings from Irina from the Outside. Winning set 3, and with some great tough line serving we went on to win the 4th and knew we had the momentum to win the game. Getting a good start in the 5th we concentrating on keeping our defence and block system solid and swinging high and early staying aggressive. Finishing up with a win in 5, it was certainly and impressive turnaround after our shaky start, and proves that we can really be competitive and dominant against the top teams in this division. Happy birthday Wendo and Nammy! Hope the win was a good present from us all
UTS Volleyball Club 