The Red Deer College Queens Alumni showed the current members of the women’s volleyball team that they still have a few tricks up their sleeves.
The Alumni knocked off both of the Queens split squad teams at the iHotel Wild Rose Classic on the weekend — RDC 1 (25-15, 25-17) in Saturday’s quarter-final and RDC 2 (25-14, 17-25, 15-10) in Sunday’s gold medal match.
“It’s that whole culture of what it is to be a Queen,” said RDC head coach Talbot Walton. “They come back and they played their hearts out and hopefully we as our current team members, see that and understand that that culture of Queens volleyball is really important to our success.”
Still Talbot was pleased with what he saw out of his current crop of players, believing that if RDC 1 had not lost in the quarter-final, they too could have been playing for a medal on Sunday. Instead they followed up the loss to the alumni with a loss to the NAIT Ooks in the consolation semifinal, dropping them to the seventh place game. They finished first in their pool in the round robin portion of the tournament.
This tournament was all about evaluating players and preparing for the up coming Alberta Colleges Athletic Conference season, which begins Oct. 17 for the Queens at the Lethbridge College Kodiaks.
The Queens randomly split their roster to two seven-player teams so everyone saw a lot of floor time, and a several players really grabbed the opportunity.
“I thought Leah Koot had a really good game, I thought she showed some promise as an outside hitter who can pass and find ways to score,” said Walton. “I thought Alex (Donaghy) had a very strong weekend as well. Both (Madelyn Quinn) and (Bronwyn Hawkes) did what we expected them to do, provide leadership and make big plays when we needed them to make big plays.”
The biggest thing heading into the season is to refine their systems play and sharpen their overall game.
“Our offence is the one thing we really have to continue to work hard at,” said Walton.
“I think we serve and pass alright, it’s just our hitting decisions and setting decisions at certain times would be really helpful for us in helping us generating more kills and opportunity for swings where we can score instead of forcing ourselves into hitting continuation type shots.”