Regional champion Carpenter High School men's volleyball team. (Carpenter High School/Facebook)

By Elliott Knopp

Volleyball Provincials

Carpenter men’s volleyball team preparing for provincials

Nov 25, 2021 | 5:58 PM

The Carpenter High School men’s volleyball team is set to appear in this year’s provincial tournament.

After running the table at last week’s regionals competition, spirits are running high and building up momentum for the final showdown of the season.

In an interview with meadowlakeNOW, coach Trent Marsh said the win has maintained the team’s competitive appetite at the highest level it’s been all year.

“It got them quite excited. Monday’s practice was probably one of the best practices we had all season,” he said.

“To see that confidence and that energy that comes from success, it was really good to see.”

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Throughout the regional competition, the Carpenter High team paved their path to victory, defeating Martensville in straight sets, then beating out E.D. Feehan from Saskatoon 2-1 in the round robin.

After their record was good enough to place first in the pool, Carpenter swept both La Loche and John Paul II enroute to winning the tournament.

As the team looks forward to replicating their success at the provincial tourney, Marsh said there are several aspects of their game that need to be cleaned up in order to achieve that goal.

“The boys, when they do work really hard on defence, tend to have a lot of success,” he said.

“Just not letting the ball hit the floor, moving really well in the back row, communicating and reading really well on the blocking.”

He also mentioned consistency with serving as one of the key areas of improvement ahead of the competition.

“We missed quite a few serves this past weekend, and we got lucky a few times because of the amount of serves that we missed to still be able to be successful in some of those matches… so hopefully we can cut down on those.”

The team will need to maintain the mentality they held throughout the regional competition that helped the team play more relaxed and focused through sets.

After suffering several injuries to key players on the roster, Marsh said the boys were able to rally around each other, leading to their success which they hope will continue to carry over into the weekend in Moose Jaw.

“The boys really embraced the underdog role, played loose and understood they were in a pretty tough spot,” he said.

“We lost them some key pieces and had other injuries throughout the year that made it tough to have all the pieces together on the court at the same time. I think just play loose, have fun, don’t get too uptight and don’t put too much pressure on yourself.”

A live stream of the tournament and updated scores from each match will be posted on the Saskatchewan High Schools Athletic Association website.

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elliott.knopp@pattisonmedia.com

On Twitter: @ElliottKnopp