Four members of the York Lions men’s volleyball team took home top honours at the 2005 Provincial Beach Volleyball Championships at Ashbridges Bay, Toronto, this past weekend. The teams of Paul Podstawka and Kevin Lewis, and Rob Dyba and Sholan Trivedi, secured the hardware at the championships.
Winning gold was the duo of Podstawka and Lewis. Podstawka led the Lions last year in kills and was selected to the Ontario University Athletics (OUA) All-Rookie team. He was also the 2003 Canadian under-18 Beach Champion. Lewis also has a Canadian under-18 Beach Championship to his credit and was a silver medalist in 2002.
Capturing silver was the team of Dyba and Trivedi. The tandem have enjoyed previous success on the beach, winning the 2004 International University Cup Beach Championship and a bronze at the 2003 Canadian Juvenile Beach Championship. The two have both been named to the OUA All-Rookie team (Dyba in 2003-2004 and Trivedi in 2004-2005).
Both teams will be heading to the 2005 National Beach Championships later this month in Coburg, Ont. Additionally, the teams will represent Canada at the World under-21 Beach Volleyball Championships in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Sept. 6-11.
In other divisions at the provincial championships, Lions OUA All-Stars Matt Anderson and Jason Kinoshita finished third in the under-24 division while former Lions Darren Goss and Domingo Miguel finished third in the senior AA division.
Goss and Miguel, former Canadian Interuniversity Sport All-Canadians, are the defending Canadian National Champions. The two, ranked number 115 in the World Beach Volleyball Rankings, are members of the National Beach Volleyball team and will play in Montreal later this month on the Féderation Internationale de Volleyball tour.