Maria Carolina Martins
If you’ve walked through the high school corridor, or browsed the Saint Maur Instagram this month, you’ve probably seen the beautiful third place trophy won by our varsity HS Girls’ Volleyball Team in the WJAA tournament that took place on October 13-14, 2023, at Canadian Academy. After some hard fought games, our players brought a shiny addition to our glass stand, also located on the HS floor.
On Thursday, October 13th, right after school, our varsity team took a shinkansen bound for Kobe, home of the falcons. The Canadian Academy of Japan has been hosting the WAJAA Tournament for more than — years, in which Saint Maur has participated for many years now. Despite having attended the event for many seasons, the HS varsity girls team has not been awarded a trophy for almost 10 years.
New tournament style
This year’s tournament was organized a bit differently than in the previous editions of the event. On October 14th, the first game day of the tournament, teams played against others from their same bracket, aiming to win as many sets and games as possible. After the first day, teams were ranked from 1st to 12th place. On the second day, the top six teams were headed to the first tournament, competing for the first place trophy. The bottom six teams had a separate tournament, competing for a recognition plaque.
In principle, the tournament was divided into two different tournaments in the second game. This new tournament style was introduced to the event with the objective of providing teams the opportunity of playing more games and play-time. Each team played a total of 5 or 6 games (depending on how many were won).
Cougars’ Trajectory
Starting the tournament with an eventful first day, our cougars played three games, against KIUA, EJ King, and OYIS. The team won the first game but lost the next two. Even after our losses,
we were still able to place 6th in the total rank, which guaranteed us a spot in the first tournament, and moved us forward in the competition for the first place trophy.
It is a beloved tradition to have a team dinner the night of the first game, and this year was no exception. We had delicious okonomiyaki that certainly gave us the much needed strength for another full day of games. Team dinners are also extremely important to promote camaraderie between team members and overall team bonding during the stressful tournament days.
On Saturday, we started the day with a win against the sharks (Fukuoka International school) and advanced to play EJ King once more. We unfortunately lost the match and the chance of playing for first place.
However, all was not lost, as we were still able to fight for third place. And so we did: in the 3rd and last match of the day, we defeated MC Perry High School, a military base school after an exciting fight for three sets, winning the last one 16-14. This placed Saint Maur third in the overall tournament and we were awarded with the much awaited 3rd place trophy.
Parents’ support
Our dear varsity parents were a BIG help during the tournament. Throughout the event, they were a constant helping hand for both the players and the coaches. They helped us with the transportation, provided snacks and energy jelly drinks to help us keep up the electrical pace of the tournament, as well as joyfully cheering us up during our games. The team would like to give a gigantic thank you to the varsity parents – without them, our team would not have been able to perform as well as it did in this tournament.
Improvement
This year’s tournament was very important for our Cougars, as the current varsity team is composed mostly of seniors, making this one our last. As expected, our Cougars gave it their all, delivering a tournament all but short of exciting games, hard fought battles and well deserved celebrations.
This exact team also participated in the WJAA tournament last year, where we won only one game and placed 11th on the overall rank. This year’s tournament is certainly a huge improvement for our Cougars, who should be extremely proud of the hard work they put into getting better, improving their personal skills, and their team performance. The team’s grit and determination really paid off. GO COUGARS!
Maria Carolina Martins