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Burnaby North sr. boys thrive as volleyball longshots

Seeded as a darkhorse, the Burnaby North senior boys Vikings spiked a few rivals’ hopes en route to finishing third at last week’s Lower Mainland AAA volleyball championships.
Burnaby North
The Burnaby North Vikings are heading to Langley for the AAA provincial championships next week, on the strength of a strong third-place finish at the Lower Mainlands.

Seeded as a darkhorse, the Burnaby North senior boys Vikings spiked a few rivals’ hopes en route to finishing third at last week’s Lower Mainland AAA volleyball championships.

It earned them a trip to Langley, where they’ll continue the journey at the B.C. tournament next week.

As the third-place squad coming out of the Burnaby-New West league, the Vikings were assigned a tough road to start the Lower Mainlands. It proved to be the right route for the upstarts.

By beating host R.A. McMath 3-2 last Thursday, Burnaby North extended its run as longshots now to the provincials.

“The boys worked hard as a team and were very determined after having a somewhat disappointing season,” Burnaby North coach Barton Lim said. “They (and I) knew that if they performed their best they had a chance to challenge many of the teams at the Lower Mainlands. The boys really displayed a ‘never give up’ attitude as we really had some challenges both on and off the court.”

Those challenges included scrambling for some momentum heading into the tournament, after losing their final two league games and finishing third in the league playoffs.

"After our loss to (Burnaby) South, the boys were really down as they knew they under performed. We lost to Moscrop 3-2 in a very close match so that loss was not necessarily a negative thing but rather made us realize we could indeed play with the better ranked teams," Lim said of the final two regular season tests.

They began the Lower Mainlands with a confidence-affirming 3-0 (28-26, 25-23, 25-18) win over No. 8-seed Sir Winston Churchill, before suffering a 3-1 (25-16, 23-25, 25-23, 25-17) setback to No. 1 David Thompson in the quarter-finals.

Being a double-knockout format, it meant the Vikings had no wiggle room the rest of the way.

They rebounded to eliminate Burnaby-New West rival Burnaby Central 3-0, despite suffering an injury to middle Alex Haight late in the final set and without any reserves. Haight was forced to play with a turned ankle for the final point, locked up on Ted Yoon’s kill.

That put them up against McMath with just six players, but a gutsy effort from libero Yoshi Inomata, who moved to middle to replace Haight, helped give the underdogs a hard-fought 3-2 win (27-25, 21-25, 25-12, 22-25, 15-8) and a guaranteed top-four finish.

“The boys never gave up and were more consistent in earning the victory,” remarked Lim.

After besting Eric Hamber 3-1, they got a rematch with Thompson, who at the last provincial rankings were placed 14th. North kept the momentum going, serving up a surprising 3-0 shutout (25-22, 26-24, 25-19) to finish third overall.

Picking up an all-star honour was offside Ryan Hum, while Devon Alsop and captain Justen Chau also made major contributions.

“(Hum) did a fantastic job all around at offside showing a variety of attacks while also displaying good defense.  His best performance was saved for the last day,” said Lim, who is joined on the sidelines by assistant Kacey Scurrah.

Capping the whole experience was the fact Lim’s other team, the junior boys Vikings, also qualified for the provincials by upsetting defending champion Richmond Christian 3-2 (25-16, 25-23, 21-25, 14-25, 18-16) in a grueling match for the Vancouver and Districts crown. That Burnaby North squad rolled undefeated in league play and swept through the league playoffs without surrendering a set.

The senior provincials are slated for Nov. 29 to Dec. 2 at the Langley Events Centre. Burnaby North, as Lower Mainland No. 3, lines up in a pool with Centennial, David Thompson and Reynolds.