Sep the 15 Sitting Women Senior
Canada Wins Final Sitting Volleyball Match at Rio Paralympics
Canada’s women’s sitting volleyball team defeated Rwanda 3-0 (25-21, 25-15, 25-20) on Thursday to finish in seventh place overall at the Rio 2016 Paralympic Games.
It feels great. We came into the tournament as underdogs and we wanted to play really hard in our last game. We did that – we went out with excitement and energy, and we played our game. We were able to get kills when we were in system, which is great.
Rwanda finishes eighth. The Rio 2016 sitting volleyball medal rounds will be played over the weekend.
With several young players new to the sport getting their first taste of a Paralympic tournament, the future is looking bright for this program.
I think that the girls have learned that it takes a lot more than what we thought coming into it to be great at the best level here. What we've really learned is we need to be consistent, we need to be able to follow a game plan, to be able to execute in a match against the world's best teams, and we're there at times but it's going to take a little bit more work and a little bit more experience at this high level. I think it means everything to us as a program; we've kind of played the underdog coming in and this was the first match that we're playing that there's a place when we finish…It was really important to end on a win and finally see all that work.
The women’s team qualified after their bronze medal performance at last year’s Parapan Am Games; the men’s team missed qualifying after a battle with the U.S. for the spot. This was the first team to represent Canada at the Paralympics in the discipline of sitting volleyball.
We put a lot of work in and have put pressure on ourselves to perform. We really supported each other, and it was very important for us to win this match. We pushed some competitive teams and developed over the tournament. I’m really proud to be part of this team.
Replay of the match
More on sitting volleyball at Rio 2016 can be found here: www.worldparavolley.org/rio-2016-paralympic-games/
To follow Team Canada at Rio 2016, go to www.paralympic.ca and use the hashtag #ParaTough on social media.