By Curtis Galbraith

Two years of planning culminates with start of volleyball provincials today in Beaverlodge

Nov 22, 2018 | 11:04 AM

Two years of planning and preparing have gone into an event that starts today in Beaverlodge.
 
The Regional High School Royals are hosting 3A girls volleyball provincials.
 
Long-time coach Erin Martin says the community had to put in a bid, saying it had enough facilities and community support.
 
“Since St. Mary’s opened up their beautiful, new school, we’ve had access to their gym and so that gives us two really awesome venues for volleyball and, so, we decided that that would be a great chance to try out our hosting skills.”
 
Three teams from this area, St. Joe’s, Beaverlodge, and Peace Wapiti Academy, are all taking part.
 
Martin says there are several reasons for the success of the local teams.
 
“We have some incredible, natural athletes from around here. We have really highly organized club programs that have some very quality coaching involved. That, I think, has enabled us to really develop our prowess in women’s volleyball.”
 
She adds Beaverlodge is “very excited” to be hosting this event.
 
“It’s providing us with an opportunity to not only acknowledge our past traditions and successes but also to acknowledge some of the wonderful talent that we have here in our school. We’ve got students that are involved in volunteerism in all kinds of ways and we have a really fun to watch, exciting, young, competitive volleyball team.”
 
A couple former Royals, Dani Smith and Gina Schmidt, are currently with Canada’s national team. Smith is a player, Schmidt a coach.
 
Games start at 2:30 this afternoon at both the Regional High School and St. Mary’s gyms. The gold medal game is set for 5:30 p.m. Saturday. A complete schedule can be found here.