Rams to lean on the value of team work and experience as provincial hosts

By Lethbridge Herald on November 20, 2024.

Herald File Photo by Justin Seward LCI Rams, from left, Tarek Jones, Oliver Billyard and Jack Ponech attempt a group effort to block the hit from Tristan Iwanczuk of the Catholic Central Cougars during Prairie Sky Conference senior varsity boys volleyball action at Catholic Central earlier this season.

By Justin Seward

Lethbridge Herald

The LCI Rams varsity boys volleyball team will look to their strength of playing together as a team and take what they learned from last year’s provincial  heading into hosting the 4A provincials this weekend.

“Just playing together as a team, learning to be consistent in every time you play and not taking any team for granted,” said Dustin McCubbing, Rams head coach, when asked about a strength the team could take from the regular season into provincials.

This is an experienced Rams team as their whole roster is all Grade 12s.

“I just think that the experience that all of them bring … will definitely contribute to playing as a team,” said McCubbing.

The Rams will look to take what they learned from last year’s provincials experience and take it into this year’s tournament.

“Hopefully we can start off just being confident and not being nervous, and we kind of know what you need to do at the event and just kind of play volleyball,” said McCubbing.

The team is not adding any extra pressure with being the hosts.

“We know that we just have to go about our jobs and try to get better each time we play and not worry about who’s winning and who’s losing,” said McCubbing.

The Rams are excited to be hosting a provincial event of this calibre.

“All of the teams that are in 4A are very competitive and a very close field,” said McCubbing.

“And just the opportunity to play in front of a home crowd of Lethbridge, which is a very fast growing volleyball community, it’s just a good opportunity to kind of let the community see what high school 4A volleyball is all about.”

This group of players have been together since Grade 9 and have that goal since then to win a provincial championship.

“We said since Grade 9 thar we want to win provincials our senior year and all year we’ve been absolutely dialled in on that,” said Sawyer MacKenzie.

MacKenzie sees team success coming from them having a positive mindset and taking a game-by-game approach.

“We know we’re good enough to be here and we (have) just got to stay focused on the process not the outcome,” said MacKenzie.

LCI is the seventh-ranked team going in.

Both of LCI’s varsity volleyball teams are hosting provincials that begin today and run through Saturday and the results can be found at http://www.asaa.ca/volleyball/2024-2025-championships/2024-asaa-4a-boys-girls-volleyball/scheduleresults.