TWU men's volleyball: Band of Brothers bears resemblance to former champs

Steven Marshall

By Howard Tsumura
The Vancouver Province

LANGLEY -- When Trinity Western Spartans men's volleyball coach Ben Josephson found out what was going on in the back yard of one of his player's homes last spring, he promptly cancelled plans for his team's off-season workouts.

No, it had nothing to do with any kind of disciplinary action. In fact it was exactly the opposite.

"One of the guys called me and said 'Coach, would you mind if we have a beach practice today?'" Josephson said Tuesday.

What the coach discovered was that his entire team had begun to hold their own training sessions at the home of Spartans' Aaron Vandenbrink, who just happens to have a regulation-sized beach court in the back yard of his Langley home.

And what it confirmed to Josephson was not only the self-starting work ethic of his young and improving, CIS-No. 9-ranked TWU side, but the comraderie that has been built into a team which this weekend, winds up its 2009-10 Canada West regular season with a pair of crucial games Friday and Saturday in Kamloops against the archrival, No. 6 Thompson Rivers WolfPack (9-7).

Based on this weekend's results, 10-6 TWU -- which has already clinched a post-season berth -- could finish anywhere from second to sixth in the final conference standings.

"We'd play until we couldn't play any more," smiles TWU leftside hitter Steven Marshall of the off-season workouts. "We'd go three or four hours or until no one could stand anymore. Then we'd have a barbecue and make some burgers."

Now three years into head coaching tenure, Josephson sees many of the traits that made the Spartans CIS national champions in 2006.

"I call this team the Band of Brothers," says Josephson, a former TWU player (1999-2003) and an assistant coach on the 2006 CIS titleists. "We had the same thing with our national championship cycle. This group has a very similar feel."

In his first recruiting class, Josephson brought in what is now, as third-year players, the core of the team: middle Rudy Verhoeff, leftsides Marc Howatson and Paul Lindemulder and setter Ben Ball.

Add the likes of fourth-year middle Josh Doornebal and second-year BCCAA transfer Marshall, and you get a team that seems ready to take the next big step of making a run through the conference playoffs and earning a berth at the CIS nationals.

And as far as Josephson is concerned, the team's greatest traits are their comraderie and their willingness to push each other hard every day. To that end, he uses a biblical reference to best illustrate how his team prepares for the daily battle.

"There is a verse that we always quote that says 'Just as iron sharpens iron, one man sharpens another,'" Josephson says. "And we have made each other better by pushing each other and it's become the mantra of our team."

Last Updated: 2010-02-12
Author: Howard Tsumura
Email: ssstew@twu.ca