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Canada gets closer to Rio de Janeiro

 

   

EDMONTON, Canada, January 9, 2015 – Hosts Canada advanced one step closer to the 2016 Rio Olympics Games by defeating Puerto Rico 3-0 (25-16, 25-22, 25-23) in the second day of actions at the NORCECA Men’s Volleyball Qualification Tournament in front of a full house at Saville Sports Centre in Edmonton on Saturday.

 

The Canadians needs one more victory against Cuba on Sunday to punch the ticket to the Olympics.  Cuba meets Mexico later today.

 

John Gordon Perrin and Daniel Jansen Vandoorn led the Canadian offense with 14 and 10 points, respectively while Dallas Soonias and Toontje Van Lankvelt each contributed nine tallies.

 

Maurice Torres was the best scorer of Puerto Rico with 14 points, followed by Sequiel Sanchez with nine points.

 

The winners dominated their opponents in all facets of the game with a 42-29 advantage in kills, 11-5 in blocks, including six by Jansen Vandoorn, and 5-3 in aces with Tyler Sanders landing three winners from the service line.

 

Glenn Hoag, Coach of Canada: “We were expecting a tough match against Puerto Rico, and that’s what we got. They’re a feisty team, and I told the guys yesterday to be careful of provoking them because they didn’t have a great match yesterday and I knew they would be fired up today. Our sub guys really made a difference today. Fred Winters was amazing off the bench, Nick too, and Rudy got us some really crucial blocks late in the match as well. That was big for us today, and if we can get that same effort tomorrow, I think we’ll be ok.”

 

On Facing Cuba:

 

They haven’t changed much from what we’ve seen of them in the past, and we’ve played them a lot in World League and NORCECA. They’re really big and physical and a very strong blocking team, so we’ll have to be careful with our attacking. But, they’re not as a strong on serve-receive so I think we can exploit them on the serve a little bit.”

 

John Gordon Perrin, Player of Canada: “That was a huge win. Winning in three straight was critical because we need all the points we can get. We’re back-to-back with Cuba now, same record, so it’s all coming down to tomorrow night. We played better today, but we didn’t play well with the lead today. We had a couple of good gaps on them, but we allowed them to close those and get back into the set. If we can keep running away with those sets when we have those leads, our game will be a lot better. I think our blocking was the difference today. We got some really key blocks late in the match that really helped us to the win.”

 

Javier Gaspar, Coach of Puerto Rico: “As soon as we stabilized our serve reception we were able to battle against Canada. We fought until the last point and that’s something I ask to my players. Tomorrow against Mexico we need to have more consistency and minimize the errors. That’s a crucial match for us and in the first two matches I have rotated my players and gave a little rest to some of them who needed it.”

 

Steven Morales, Player of Puerto Rico: “I think we played an excellent game against Canada and it helps us to be ready for the match against Mexico. The key for us is to continue playing together and then get the victory in the most important match for our team.”