Weekend wrap: Canadian women 2-1 in prelims at Sitting Volleyball World Championships

SARAJEVO – Canada’s women’s sitting volleyball team won two of its three matches in the preliminary round at the world championships this past weekend, but it might have been its loss that was most impressive.

The Canadians brought world number-one and Paralympic Games champion USA to the five-set limit on Sunday before finally falling (22-25, 25-22, 21-25, 25-12, 15-7). The Canadians were fourth at the Tokyo Games and left no doubt in that thriller that they are serious medal contenders.

“That was a tough five-set loss to the USA, but I couldn’t be more proud of the way we showed up and competed,” said Canada’s women’s head coach Nicole Ban. “We served aggressively and were able to utilize our offense against the number-one ranked team in the world. We are continually showing our improvements and ability to play the game at a high level.”

Just a few hours later, the women produced a giant win beating Iran 25-10, 25-14, 23-25, 25-13 to wrap up the first phase of round-robin play. Canada now awaits the conclusion of Monday’s games to find out its opponents for Tuesday’s playoff opener.

“We knew Iran was going to be a tough opponent,” said team captain Danielle Ellis. “The last time we played them was about six years ago in China, so we didn’t have a lot to game plan on them, but we watched video from the last couple of days… We just went out there and played our game with some tough serves to put them in trouble and just stayed aggressive the whole game.”

Canada beat Slovenia 25-18, 25-21, 19-25, 25-22 in its opener on Saturday.

Men’s team falls to Ukraine

In men’s competition at the Sitting Volleyball World Championships, Canada was 1-2 in the preliminary round. The squad swept Poland on Saturday for its sole win, and lost to Germany and Brazil on Friday and Sunday.

On Monday, in the round of 16, the Canadians lost to Ukraine 25-21, 25-23, 23-25, 26-24 and will now compete in the 9-16 placement round. Their next opponent is Rwanda on Tuesday.

All matches are streamed live on World ParaVolley’s YouTube channel.

Canadian contingent gains valuable experience at Para Badminton World Championships

Yuka Chokyu of Vancouver and Wyatt Lightfoot of Assiniboia, Sask. both advanced to the playoff round in singles play before being eliminated at the 2022 Para Badminton World Championships which concluded on Sunday in Tokyo.

Chokyu, a silver medallist at the 2019 Parapan American Games in Lima, won two of her three matches in the preliminaries before falling to Henriett Koosz of Peru in the women’s wheelchair quarterfinal 21-5, 21-8.

Lightfoot, 19, also went 2-1 in the prelims and lost to Victor Tavares of Brazil 21-4, 21-11 in the round of 16.

Other Canadians at the worlds were William Roussy of Maria, Que., Justin Kendrick of Oakville, Ont., Mikhail Bilenky of Burnaby, B.C., and Rishav Sharma of Fort St. John, B.C.