June 11, 2024: The third competition week of 2024 Volleyball Nations League’s preliminary phase is underway in Fukuoka, Japan, for Canada's women's team.

It was not the start that Canada was hoping for, with a 3-0 loss (25-16, 25-15, 25-14) to Italy in the week’s opening match for these two teams.

"Italy is an exceptional team, I’d say one of the strongest teams we have faced so far this year," said Canada’s head coach, Shannon Winzer. "We didn’t play to our full potential for sure, and that is disappointing, no one wants to lose like that, but the margin of error becomes even smaller against such a strong team."

Stats favoured Italy: 37 to 30 attack points, 11 to 1 blocks, and 7 to 2 in serves. Canada lost eight more points to errors than Italy.

"We struggled on first contact, we struggled on attack…. It just wasn’t a good game at our end. The best thing we can do is take what we can from it and move on as quickly as possible. What we do next is the most important thing."

Opposite Paola Egonu of Italy led the charge with 18 points for her team; Kiera Van Ryk contributed 13 points to Canada’s effort.

Canada is still in a tight race to qualify for Paris 2024. More on that process can be found here: https://bit.ly/3xfcDB0

Canada’s next match is against host Japan on June 13.

Viewers guide:
-All matches are streamed on VBTV and CBC Sports and CBC Gem.
-VNL Web site: https://en.volleyballworld.com/volleyball/competitions/volleyball-nations-league/

The women’s team is still in contention to qualify for Paris 2024 via the World Rankings.

Seven women’s teams are already qualified for the Games. The remaining five places are filled by selecting the top five not yet qualified teams in the FIVB World Ranking as of the end of the preliminary phase of Volleyball Nations League.

VNL Roster
Brie O'Reilly – Langley, BC
Courtney Baker - Bridgewater, NS
Emily Maglio – Coquitlam, BC
Jazmine White – Oshawa, ON
Alicia Ogoms – Winnipeg, MB
Layne Van Buskirk – Windsor, ON
Alexa Gray (C) – Calgary, AB
Hilary Johnson – Calgary, AB
Andrea Mitrovic – Mississauga, ON
Vicky Savard – Jonquière, QC
Kiera Van Ryk – Surrey, BC
Shainah Joseph – Ottawa, ON
Julia Murmann – Toronto, ON
Kacey Jost – St. Albert, AB

Staff:
Shannon Winzer - Head coach
Vincenzo Mallia - Asst. coach
Matt Krueger - Asst. coach
Kevin Valcke - Physiotherapist
Gabriele Tortorici - Statistician
Rob Hooper - IST lead
Hilary Mallinger - Physiotherapist
Roger Friesen - Mental performance coach
Julien Boucher - High performance director
Jennah Paron - Team coordinator

Volleyball Canada Media Contact:
Jackie Skender
jskender@volleyball.ca
Mobile: 613-794-7676