MEN’S VOLLEYBALL EARN FIRST EVER MEDAL AT PROVINCIALS WITH BRONZE

The Georgian Grizzlies men's volleyball team competed at the 2020 OCAA Men's Volleyball Championship from Feb. 27-29 hosted by Fleming College in Peterborough, ON.

The Grizzlies opened the tournament against the number three ranked team in the OCAA west division standings, the Niagara Knights.

After dropping the first set, Georgian responded in a big way to take each of the next three sets in a 3-1 victory from set scores of 23-25, 25-22, 25-15 and 25-13.

Kaelan Kloetstra (London) led the Grizzlies in scoring with 17 points from 12 kills, three aces and two blocks while teammate Cameron Calhoun (Stayner) had 14 points from 11 kills, two blocks and an ace.

This setup the Grizzlies in a semi-final match against the Humber Hawks, the number one ranked team in Canada who hold a perfect record on the season.

Georgian battled hard throughout the game but were unable to stop the Hawks scoring as they fell in straight sets 3-0.  Set scores were 25-18, 25-17 and 25-18 for Humber.

Kloetstra once again led the Grizzlies in scoring with eight kills, while Gibson Graham (Markham) was named player of the game for Georgian with 22 assists in the contest.

The Grizzlies then wrapped the tournament in the bronze medal match against the reigning provincial and national champions in the Fanshawe Falcons.

Georgian again battled hard, but dropped the first two sets by scores of 25-23 each time. In the third set the Grizzlies showed their resiliency to battle back to take the set 25-22 and then in the fourth Georgian took another tight one 25-23 to send the game to a fifth and deciding tiebreak set.

The game continued to go back and forth all the way to the finish and it was the Grizzlies who were able to complete the incredible comeback taking the fifth set 15-13 to defeat the Falcons 3-2.

Cameron Calhoun was named player of the game for the Grizzlies as well as being named a tournament all-star.

The Grizzlies have played in three of the last four bronze medal games at the provincial championship but this was the first medal win in Georgian school history for men's volleyball.

For more information on the 2020 OCAA Men's Volleyball Championship visit the official website.