Team BC's U16 girls' volleyball team celebrates the gold medal win after securing the game winning point. Photo courtesy: Mark Lafleur

By Tommy Osborne

National Champions

Prince George athletes earn gold medal at National Championship

Aug 2, 2024 | 4:30 PM

PRINCE GEORGE – Several Prince George athletes and coaches recently earned a gold medal at the U16 Canada Cup National Championship. Hosted in Calgary, Team BC’s U16 Volleyball Girls’ team took home the gold after a dominant tournament that saw the team go 18-4 in sets.

“I was so proud of us and I just didn’t expect it to happen at all going into a tournament, but it was just such an accomplishment with the team and making a whole bunch of new friends, and then getting to play with them was so much fun, and I loved getting the gold medal with them,” said Delaney Turner, a Prince George player on the team.

“It was really exciting. It didn’t feel real at first. We were down, all of a sudden we just came back together and won. We had worked so hard for that. We were so excited to just at least be at the tournament, and winning just topped it off,” said fellow teammate Tyler Dahl.

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Beyond Dahl and Turner, Prince George also made an impact through Assistant Coach Mark Lafleur and Program Lead Chris Dahl. Tyler Dahl played a huge role in winning the gold, as she actually earned the Maple Award as Team BC’s MVP.

“It was super exciting, I’m really grateful for that. It made me feel really good that my team had a lot of trust in me, and my coaches also did, and it felt like I was reliable for the team,” Dahl said.

“Tyler was a very well-rounded athlete for us. She was on the floor most of the time and did a lot of great things for us off the court as well,” added Lafleur when speaking on her impact.

While the 18-4 record in sets would seem to indicate a relatively easy tournament for Team BC, the gold medal match was anything but. After falling behind 2-1 in sets to Team Alberta Black, Team BC was just one set away from a potential loss. However, the team rallied and stepped up, winning the fourth set and then the fifth set in convincing fashion with a 15-8 score.

“They never gave up. They always fought. They worked hard, they stuck together, they did all the little things, and that’s what got them through at the end. And those are things, intangibles, that we can’t teach,” Lafleur said.

“We had to really trust each other and believe that as a team we could come back, and we had to reset and focus on the game,” said Dahl.

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