Belmont secondary teams ran into some tough opponents at their respective B.C. high school volleyball championship tournaments this weekend.
After a couple of playoff near-misses, the Bulldogs senior boys got the job done in their final two matches Saturday in Langley to finish 17th overall.
Belmont wound up third in their pool with a 1-2 match record. One of their losses, however, was a narrow 23-25, 25-8, 17-19 defeat at the hands of eventual pool winner Centennial of Vancouver. Had they posted a win there, Belmont would have been placed in the championship draw.
As it was, they lost a thrilling five-set marathon to Steveston-London from Richmond in their playoff opener, then pounded out straight-set wins over Prince George secondary (25-23, 25-16) and Penticton (25-22, 25-23).
Among the other Island teams competing, Oak Bay finished fourth, G.P Vanier of Courtenay sixth and Dover Bay of Nanaimo ninth.
In the senior girls' AAAA provincials in Cranbrook, Belmont was in tough, as head coach Mike Toakley had predicted.
After finishing third in their pool on Thursday with an identical 1-2 record to the Belmont boys, the Bulldogs girls lost a pair of playoff round matches. They scored their lone playoff victory in their final match Saturday, beating David Thompson of Vancouver 29-27, 25-14 to finish up 15th.
Following the round robin, the Bulldogs were dropped to the B side draw with a straight-set loss to Moscrop of Burnaby (10-25, 22-25, 17-25), then lost a tight match 25-15, 19-25, 13-15 to Mount Boucherie of Kelowna. A 19-25, 21-25 loss to the host Mount Baker team left Belmont one last chance to avoid last place.
The Island's AAAA girls champ, Oak Bay, wound up 12th, going 2-2 in playoff round matches following a third-place pool finish.
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