The St. Mary Marauders are senior boys city champions after defeating the Carlton Crusaders in straight sets on Wednesday night in front of a packed gym at St. Mary
St. Mary took the sets 25-20, 25-13 and 25-23.
Head coach Rene Quintal says the Marauders were able to fight off some strong serves from Carlton all night.
“We did a good job defending some real fast serves, like from a velocity standpoint. Everyone of Carlton’s servers would have been serving the ball above 60 kilometers an hour, so we really struggled controlling the velocity of the serve and to be able to side out. I was happy that as the match went on, we were able to fight off there. We were putting a ton of pressure on our serve receivers, and I thought toward the end of the match, we were able to kind of fight through all that pressure and we were able to side out.”
The game provided a rare opportunity for St. Mary to play on home court against their crosstown rival in Carlton.
Quintal says it was special for the team to play in front of a big crowd.
“It means a lot, we have a really good support from the family of our 12 players. They were all in attendance and then their classmates were there. It’s always nice when the gym is full and we can compete in front of a packed gym.”
St. Mary and Carlton will have a week to prepare for the upcoming regional tournament for a shot at a provincial berth.
Quintal says there were several lessons St. Mary was able to take away from the match.
“I think Carlton exposed us a little bit in terms of just the way they served at us. They were a real strong serving team and really put a lot of pressure on the receivers. I thought their setter ran a real balanced offense, so we really had to focus on looking at his hands in order to form our blocks. Carlton did a really good job in match making adjustments in terms of serving at our receivers. I thought they did a good job with their coaching staff, identifying the passes they wanted to serve at and they ran their offense really well overall.”
Both Carlton and St. Mary will advance to the 5A Boys Regional tournament on Nov. 9
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