Name: Ashley Voth Position: Middle Year: 2

January 7

After a few days off and exams were all done with, our team headed off to Tampa. WOOOO! The trip we were looking forward to since the day we were told me we going… so probably June!! Christmas day came and went. Although we were all pretty mad we had to be at the airport for 4:30 a.m., we got over pretty quickly when we reminded ourselves that we were on our way to sun!

And then we were off!

Day 1– Our first day in Florida was spent at Busch Gardens! I love roller coasters, so this has got to be the best place in the world! The weather was perfect. By the end of the day we had conquered all of the roller coasters, whether we wanted to or not! The best one in my opinion was the Montu. A dangle feet roller coaster, filled with many twists and turns. The wooden one is also at the top of my lists, but most girls did not like that one.

Day 2 – Our first day of playing. Our day started off in the morning with an hour practice. This was the first practice we had in quite a while. We had to get rid of some of the Christmas rust; therefore we did a lot of ball control drills. After a few hours spent in the sun we went back at night to play York, a team in the Ontario conference. We had some trouble at the start, and York played great defence, and served tough. The final score was 3-2. We knew we were going to have to pick it up for the next match.

Day 3 – Our third day looked very similar to the previous day, with practice in the morning, then spending some time in the sun, although unfortunately it was not as hot as the previous two days. At night, we played McMaster, another team in the Ontario conference. We played much better volleyball, we beat them three straight.

Day 4 – We played Acadia at night, a team in the Atlantic league. We also beat them three straight.

Day 5 – New Year’s Eve, was our last day of competition in Tampa. We played McMaster in the final. We beat them three straight. Again there were some very good rallies contributed by both teams. It was great to end our Florida tournament on a positive note.

Day 6 – New Year’s Day! A day off. Some of us took in some last minute rays (even though it was cloudy and windy we thought we might still get some color J) because we won’t see the sun till May where we are from! Others took the day to do some shopping at a near by mall!

In conclusion, I would have to say Florida was pretty fun. It was great to see the sun, and palm trees of course, get a chance to play some different teams that would not get to play otherwise.

Day 7 – We were then off to Ottawa for our second tournament of the trip. After a few mishaps - some flight delays, an explosion of someone’s bag, and someone forgot their passport :O (Not mentioning any names... HAHA), we all got to Ottawa safely! We definitely were not ready for the weather shock… man its cold in Canada! We were complaining the whole time in Florida that is was not hot enough… but we were wrong! That weather was so nice! It was cold in Ottawa, and because we took a sun vacation, jackets were not first on our packing list, so it was one pretty cold weekend. Not to mention the up hill 15 minute trek in slush from our hotel to the gym. Apart from the weather, the weekend was pretty good!

Day 8 – 12

The tournament consisted of six teams, Ottawa, Laurier, Sherbrooke, UNB, McGill and us. In the end it worked out that we played every team, so that was great to play new teams. We played UNB and McGill in our pool the first day. Yes, two games in one day! Now that I’m getting older, this seems so much harder every time! We won both matches! We then crossed over and played Sherbrooke. This match was pretty intense. The teams from Quebec are known for their super good defence. Therefore, it was a long match. I believe it went to five and we came up on top! Laurier was our next opponent. We beat Laurier in four. Again, they played some tough defence. The final was next up for us. We played the home team Ottawa and played some really good volleyball in this match, probably our best of the trip. We beat them in 3. Again it was super good to end on a positive note.

Our last evening away we went out as a team to Don Cherry’s Restaurant. It was a nice conclusion to our trip! The next step was to stuff everything we brought plus what we bought back into our luggage (at least that’s what I had to do), which always seems harder on the way home. We then returned home Sunday.

We now have five days to prepare for our first set of matches after the break, which is Trinity Western. They were the team that we lost to at Nationals one year ago, so these are important matches!

Any comments or feeback please Email: bison_sports@umanitoba.ca

November 26

Hello! It is me again. I am here to report some of the events that occurred between November 9 and Nov 24.

The game Friday November 9 against UBC was quite the game, I must say…. I’m pretty sure any one at the game could say it was a well-fought match by both sides!! There were some seriously great plays being made all around from both sides!! After being up 20-12, or something like that in the first, then losing (which was pretty bad) we knew it was going to be a long one from the start. Sure enough… we won the next two sets (by a considerably good amount in the third). We went into the fourth with a lot of confidence, but in the end we came up barely short and lost 30-28 or something crazy like that. Next came our specialty…. Fifth sets!!! Right girls?? At the change over we were up 8-0 and yes we did win this one for the match!

Saturday’s match… well we lost… in five sets. I’m not going to say too much about this one. It’s not fun to talk about the bad ones! All I will say is that we were down 2-0, and then we came back and were tied 2-2, but we lost the fifth, 15-8. I think.

We then had to bounce back, because we were off to Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, in four days.… After some very chocolately cup cakes that we all ate for Amy Mathews’ birthday at the airport, we were off. This was in fact our first away league game this season.

The first night, we won 3-1. We won the first, then lost the second and then won the next two. The first three sets we pretty close, we had a lot of long rallies, but we beat them by quite a bit in the fourth! The second night was 3-0! Our team played very well! It was good to end the weekend in BC on a good note.

Saturday night, of course is our own. Some us chose to spend the night out, some chose to stay in. Can I add that Amy Penner and I, took the skytrain (yes mom! We went all alone) across part of the city. It was really fun, and not that hard to figure it out…after 30 minutes of asking people and looking at maps we got to where we needed to be! :P!

Sunday is the day we travel back home. Our flight was pretty late, so we spent the day as tourists in Vancouver. Sarah, Barnes and Amy Penner were off to Stanley Park to take in some beautiful sights (I can imagine.. I don’t really know), and the rest of us spent the afternoon on Granville Island. This also was the first time it did not rain all weekend, so that was also a good thing! I would compare this area to the Forks. The highlight of the afternoon was definitely the chocolate samples we got from a chocolate store (chocolate should be a meal on its own in my opinion!!), as well as the hammock store, in which we spent quite some time in debate on whether or not to make a purchase! This is where Christine and Sam invested in the most comfortable chair you can ever sit in. We were then off to the airport to header home. After an hour and a half flight delay, we were off!

The week was spent preparing for our match versus Calgary. Calgary and us have a long history in the last two years. In my CIS career (so this year and last year) we have played Calgary probably five to six times, we have never lost, but we went to five sets EVERY single time! We knew this weekend was important, but also going to be tough! I’m not going to lie, I had a few butterflies at the beginning of the first set.

Friday night we won in three! We played one of our best games of the season, and I think we even surprised ourselves a bit! Therefore we knew we could not take them lightly the second night. Saturday night came. We won in three again! We also played some of our best volleyball!

So all in all I would say it was a pretty sweet weekend for volleyball! This weekend was our last games before we start the second half! The Bisons have the conference bye the last weekend of play.

Our December schedule will consist of practising and maybe some studying?? But practises are not as heavy, and not as often. We will go not every day, I think three to four times a weekend, maybe two to three, I can’t remember, but it is less. The 26th is going to be an important date to remember, because although it is Boxing Day, it is the day we leave for Florida!! Yes I will say it again, we are going to see palm trees, SUN, and some roller coasters! (all my favourite things all at once! WHOA!) Needless to say, I’m looking forward to it, and I know the whole team is as well! From Florida we are off to Ottawa for a mid-season tournament to take on some eastern teams!

MERRY CHRISTMAS and HAPPY NEW YEAR! Enjoy your holiday!

Thanks for reading!

Any comments or feeback please Email: bison_sports@umanitoba.ca

November 5

Hello! My name is Ashley Voth. I am a second year middle hitter on our team. I was born and raised in Winnipeg, and I am St Mary’s Graduate. And I am here to tell you our story!

Our Bison women’s volleyball team this year consists of most of the same players as the previous year. We lost one fifth year player, and our setters. But no worries there, we now have a 6’3” setter… yes you read correct 6’3” (be afraid, be very afraid)!!!! Together we have four new rookies! Who are great (ALL very talented) might I add, and a perfect addition to our team! (I hope they are reading this).

After having really a picture perfect season last year (minus our showing at Nationals, but really its somewhat of a touchy subject, so we don’t talk about it much), our team started off the season with high goals that we have set and super high determination to go all the way this year. Practises even started one week before school did in a tiny high school gym, doing rep over rep to get that summer rust out before the rest of the competition does :) !

After a solid two weeks (or more… I don’t remember) of practicing three hours per day, our season commenced at the annual U of W tournament. This tournament was set up so that it was only round robin play, so no winner in the end. We played five matches. Including the team (Trinity Western) that we lost to at nationals last year…. Don’t worry we beat them this time in three!! We won all our other matches as well! The tournament attracted teams from all over the country because the NORCECA championships were in Winnipeg this week, so we also got a chance to see some competitive international volleyball. Can I also add that all week we had to practise in the Brown gym (at Frank Kennedy Centre)….

But back to work it was for us Monday after the tournament, because we had four days before we made the trek out to Regina for our second tournament. We had come to defend our title. This being the first time on the road with our new team, it was great to get a chance for us to get to know our rooks. At this tourney, we got a chance to play some of the best! We played Alberta, last year’s national champs. We beat them! Good news is we defended our title.
Once it was over, we made the trip home, only to realize that in four days we were back to Saskatchewan…. This time three hours farther to U of S in Saskatoon! But no complaints there, we all did it with a positive attitude. We also won this tourney, playing Regina in the final. I would have to say a highlight of the weekend would have been playing Calgary in the round robin play. After being down 2-0, we fought back hard and won in the fifth set with a 16-14 score… PHEW that was too close for comfort! (but also brings back many memories from last year… right girls??, I don’t think we want to relive any of those times) .

But once you drive nine hours, you have to drive nine hours home…so we get home very late that night, only to find out we got two very well needed days off!

So we were back in the gym on Wednesday and have three weeks of practise before our league started.

Our season opened with Regina at home one week ago. We beat them both nights 3-1. They were all pretty solid sets (Nothing really important or exciting to report here). We had some fun these matches, running some of the new combo’s that we had been practising.

This past weekend, we played our cross-town rivals, U of Winnipeg in the Duckworth Challenge. The first night at home we played in front of a very enthusiastic crowd of resident students. It was awesome; it’s always better when the crowd is on your side! The games were extremely close, both teams fighting hard; there were some great plays on both sides of the net. After us being down in both the second and third set, we showed what we could do and we came up on top. We won the match 3-0.

On Saturday, we played them in their home territory. Again there was a very good crowd! After the long and gruelling men’s match, it was finally our turn to play. We came up on top once again. The games were not as close; we played some of our best volleyball!!

Next week we play UBC at home, should be two competitive matches!

I think this is all I have to say about that. Thanks for reading!

Any comments or feeback please Email: bison_sports@umanitoba.ca