By Garth McLennan, Sports
Editor

he Douglas College men’s
"Tens squad fell short

at Provincials at the end
of February, losing out in the
quarterfinals on the tournament’s
opening day.

The Royals were the underdogs ©
heading into the competition, seeded
sixth, and fell 3-1 to the third ranked
University of the Fraser Valley.
Vancouver Island University and
UBC Okanagan finished the regular
season first and second and as a result
gained byes into the semi-finals.

When their quarterfinal game
opened, the Royals looked like they
were in line for a surprising win. They
came out strong and took the game’s
first set 25-23, but UFV responded
by winning the next three to wrap up
the match and the Royals’ tournament
hopes. Douglas was without third-
year setter Samuel Shaw, who was

Douglas men fall short at volleyball provincials

forced to miss the tournament with a
broken hand.

At least Douglas can take solace
in the fact that they weren’t the
only ones to have trouble with the
Cascades. A day after defeating the
Royals, UFV blanked the second
seeded VIU Mariners 3-0 before
falling in the gold medal game to
Camosun, who successfully defended
their championship from last year.

While the Royals were unable
to make their presence felt at
Provincials, that wasn’t the case
at the end of year awards banquet,
where on-court leader Kaleb Dawe
and Mike Plantinga were named to
the league’s second all-star team and
6-foot-5 middle freshman Andrew
Robson took a spot on the all-rookie
squad. Plantinga has announced that
this was his final season playing for
the Royals, who bowed out in the
Provincial quarterfinals for the second
consecutive season.

 

 

Sidney Crosby

 

Canada’s captains

.¢&
as oiT's,

Crosby shone the brightest, but Team Canada had no shortage of star performers

By Garth McLennan, Sports Editor

eam Canada battled their
way to Olympic gold in

men’s hockey two weeks
ago in Vancouver, and much of
their success has been rightly
attributed to overtime hero Sidney
Crosby and Canucks stalwart
Roberto Luongo. However, when
you dig a bit deeper, there was just
so much leadership on this team,
you’d be hard-pressed to find a
group better suited to the ridiculous
pressure this squad faced over
those two weeks.

This may have been Crosby’s
team, but just take a glance at the
roster for Canada. Yes, there was a
plethora of spectacular talent there,
but there were also nine full-time
NHL captains on the 23-man roster
and two more (Patrick Marleau and
Chris Pronger) who wore the “C”
for their teams last season and one
more, in goalie Martin Brodeur,
who is as close to being a captain
as one can possibly be.

beyond brilliant on the backend in
OT, and was a fixture at breaking
out of the Canadian end. Chicago’s
Jonathan Toews, just 21 years old,
and Philadelphia’s Mike Richards
brought an unmatched level of
intensity and fore-checked like
demons. Eric Staal of Carolina
and Marleau of San Jose were
electrifying all game. Columbus’
Rick Nash played like the game’s
preeminent power forward.

More than anyone else though,
there was Sidney Crosby, the face
of Canadian hockey and the captain
of the defending Stanley Cup
champion Pittsburgh Penguins. If
there were any lingering doubts
about the best hockey player
the world has seen since Wayne
Gretzky, those have now irrefutably
been put to rest. Crosby took the
team and led them go a gold medal
that this nation had to have. As a
finishing touch he drove hard to
the net in overtime and beat U.S.
goaltender and tournament MVP
Ryan Miller for one of the biggest

“If there were any lingering doubts about the best hockey player the world has
seen since Wayne Gretzky, those have now irrefutably been put to rest. Crosby
took the team and led them go a gold medal that this nation had to have.”

So when Team USA’s Zach

. Parise jammed the puck in

behind Luongo with 24.4 seconds
remaining in the third period to
send the Olympic gold medal game
to overtime, a lesser group would
have folded. The momentum,
which has belonged to America

§ for most of the game’s final frame,
_ had swung even further towards

the surging Americans. The eyes
of over 16 million Canadians
across the country, who had sky-

_ high expectations of gold on home

soil, were glued to how Team
Canada would respond, and make
no mistake, that was very real
pressure.

Yes, the weight of the world
was indeed on Team Canada’s
shoulders, but they responded in
the best of ways, and in the end,
it was their captains who brought

home the gold. Vancouver’s

Luongo entrenched himself,
Anaheim’s Scott Niedermayer was

goals in the history of this game.

For Luongo, he finally won the
big game. For Crosby, he became
the game’s ultimate winner with a
Stanley Cup victory and Olympic
gold medal inside a year. More
than that though, he cemented his
place. Sidney Crosby no longer
has to be compared with Alexander
Ovechkin. He beat the Russian
gunner’s Washington Capitals in
seven thrilling games during last
year’s playoffs and he beat the
reigning NHL MVP’s Team Russia,
who most had favoured to win the
Olympic tournament, in a defining
quarterfinals game.

Ovechkin may be flashier, he
may be able to score goals as well
or better than Crosby, but after
this tournament, there is no doubt
who the better player is, and who
the undisputed face of the game is.
It’s Sidney Crosby, the captain of
Canadian hockey.

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