CHARLESTON, Virginia Occidental. Canada started the 2023 NORCECA Senior Men’s Continental Championship strong by beating the Dominican Republic 3-0 (25-11, 25-8, 25-12) in the group stage at the Charleston Coliseum and Convention Center.
Canada dominated the game, leading in spikes (39-17), blocks (15-0) and serves (6-2).
Canada had the game’s top four scorers, led by offensive player Stephen Marr, who had 14 points on 11 kills, two blocks and an ace. Against Arthur, Szwarc had 10 points with seven kills and three blocks.
Adrian Figueroa led the Dominican Republic with seven points in seven attacks.
Canada coach Tuomas Sammelvuo: “It’s important to start with a win. I will concentrate and concentrate outside of the game. Whatever the result, we were very focused and concentrated. Even though we were many points ahead, it didn’t affect our focus on our own game.”
Canada’s captain Nick Hoag: “We’re trying to focus on our side regardless of who’s on the other side. We’ll try to do that throughout the game, especially in preparation for the Olympic qualifier. The main takeaway from this game is that we should be fine with reducing our bugs, so we’re taking out a lot of variations and making them play. Our defense will do the rest of the work and we did that today. I found that we communicated very well. We stayed true to our game plan and if someone went off plan, we got them back on track.”
José Gutiérrez Sánchez, Dominican Republic coach: “It was a very difficult game for us. We know. Canada are a very good team. We have a young team for the future. They put pressure on our service desk and we made a lot of mistakes. When you have a young team, that kind of thing happens.”
