Selection Camp invitees Announced

Canadian Interuniversity Sport, in conjunction with Volleyball Canada officially announce the Coaching and Support staff for the Canadian women’s volleyball team.

This team will compete at the 2015 Summer Universiade in Gwangju, South Korea (July 3-14), as well as the 32 players invited to the selection camp in June.

Olivier Trudel, Head Coach of the University of Montreal Carabins since 1999 will be over seeing the squad of talented athletes and no doubt will be up to the task of performing on the world stage.

He also held the position in 2009 in Belgrade, Serbia, before returning to the FISU Games as an assistant coach in 2013 in Kazan, Russia.

Working alongside Trudel in Gwangju will be Ryan Hofer ( associate head coach) and Michelle Wood.

Hofer guided his Trinity Western University Spartans to the first CIS title in program history last March and was also Trudel’s assistant in Belgrade in 2009.

Wood has guided the Acadia University Axe-Women for the past three years and previously played for the Toronto Varsity Blues from 2005 to 2010.

“Michelle has moved up through the coaching ranks very quickly. She took part in the Canada Games, among other competitions. She is very organized and will bring dynamism as well as a unifying effect to the team.”

Rounding out the support staff will be team manager Mike Ling from Queen’s University and Athletic Therapist Laurianne Crevier from the University of Montreal.

Ling was appointed head coach at Queen’s in 2014 after 14 years as an assistant with the Alberta Pandas.

The 32 student-athletes selected to attend the National training camp from June 1-7 in Langley were also announced on Friday.

These players, all of whom compete for CIS universities, were preselected by coaches from across the country.

This was in cooperation with Arnd Ludwig (Senior National Team Head Coach) and Julien Boucher (Director of Volleyball Canada’s Women’s High-Performance Program) and only twelve (12) will make the final roster.

Trinity Western (7), Montreal (5) and Alberta (4) are the best-represented schools on the preliminary list and overall, 13 Universities have at least one athlete competing for a ticket to Gwangju.

Of the group, two players have previous Universiade experience. Lisa Barclay from UBC and Alicia Perrin from Trinity Western both wore the Maple Leaf at the last two FISU Games in Kazan (2013) and in Shenzhen, China (2011).

With a sixth-place finish at the last Universiade in Kazan, Canada matched its third best result in women’s volleyball at the FISU Games.

The Canucks placed fourth in 1983 in Edmonton and in 1997 in Sicily, Italy, and had also finished sixth in 1985 in Kobe, Japan.

In the preliminary round of the 16-team Gwangju tournament, Canada will battle in Group D with Thailand, Turkey and Zimbabwe.

The official schedule is to be released in the next short while, so we will patiently wait.

Special “thanks” to Michel Belanger for the info.