Losing a championship stings. It hurts. It hurts even more when you snap an illustrious legacy of 24 consecutive banners in the process.
That’s exactly the pain Dalhousie’s men’s volleyball team may recall this weekend, much to their displeasure, when the league-leading UNB Varsity Reds return to the Dalplex for the first time since last February when the V-Reds did the unthinkable: steal a championship from the Tigers.
To Dal, it was a robbing of the worst kind. You could see the pain on the players’ faces when they saw the other side of the floor erupt in jubilation. You could hear the loud shriek when a player’s shoe angrily scraped against the gym floor, its sound piercing through the building. This Dal team would be remembered as the ones that ended the streak.
Graduating senior Max Burt told the *Gazette* shortly after that he “never, ever imagined my career ending like this.” He, like his team, expected championships, and maybe even a national crown; he didn’t expect to miss the dance in his last chance.
When the two rivals face off at the Dalplex Feb. 10-11 it will be behind the backdrop not just of last year’s changing of the guard, but at the outset of a welcome change to the league: a new era in the rivalry.
See, men’s volleyball has a grand total of three teams in the loop. Yes, three. You’ve got the habitual winners in Dal, the bridesmaids in UNB and the regular sad-sacks in Memorial. The circuit was actually four teams strong until 2006 when Moncton dropped out.
Either way, when UNB got to strap on the wedding dress themselves last year it was an affirmation of what has already been seen around the league for a number of years. The V-Reds were creeping on Dal’s dominance; they were bound to eventually take the league crown, and in 2011 they did just that.
UNB’s victory, too, was seen as a blessing to the league—a loop so small they must play three interlock tournaments a season with Quebec universities to have some fresh faces to play against.
A one-horse race is not desirable to any league, AUS included. It prevents other schools from putting in the considerable financial resources needed to field a team of their own. A two-horse race, however, is a notable improvement. It gives the other teams a hope they can one day compete with the best themselves.
The league still has a long way to go, given it’s still a formality that Dal and UNB will compete in the AUS championships every year. But this is a much-needed change. A two-sided battle between rivals for the league crown is far better than simply handing it to Dal. It’s good for the teams. It’s good for the fans. It’s good for the sport.
Although we may groan the state of the three-team circuit, we cannot ignore the bright side of UNB’s continued success. In the immediate timeline, this weekend’s matches will be brilliant. The matches are regularly among the top Dal sporting events you can catch on campus. V-Reds outside hitter Julio Fernandez is simply dominant, and will be the man to watch on the opposing side. Meanwhile, fifth-year Graeme Higgins will lead the charge for Dal. We’ll see how Dal will adapt without Daniel Bremner on the attack in what is surely the team’s most important matches since the holiday break when Bremner and his rookie brother William quit the team.
On a weekend when Dal is sure to add two more AUS banners in swimming, it’s nice to know the men’s volleyball banner is no longer a guarantee.
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