MONTREAL -- The McGill women's volleyball team opened their preseason with a 4-1 record and a bronze medal finish at the UQAM Invitational, an eight-school tournament held over the weekend at the Centre Sportif de l'UQAM.
 
After dropping the tourney opener 3-0 to the Alberta Pandas on Friday, the defending RSEQ champion Martlets showed their mettle and reeled off four consecutive victories. They rebounded for a 3-0 decision over Ottawa on Friday evening, followed with identical 3-1 victories over York and Queen's on Saturday, then won Sunday's rematch with Ottawa 3-1 to finish third.
 
"It was a good first weekend for us and I was happy with the consistency in our serve receive," said Rachèle Béliveau, who has returned for her 32nd year and 31st season as head coach at McGill. "We had to adjust our lineup quite a bit during the week as a number of players were dealing with some health issues. But one of our strengths is that we have a lot of depth this year and can move players around without much (disruption). There's still a lot of work to be done and our league will be tough but this team has a lot of potential."
 
The roster features good height and is loaded with veterans, including eight seniors, five juniors and five sophomores to go along with three freshmen.
 
The squad will be led again by co-captains Charlene Robitaille, a 24-year-old grad student in nutritional science, who hails from St. Jean, Que., and senior Victoria Iannotti, 23, a software engineering senior from St. Laurent, Que.
 
Robitaille paced the team over the weekend with 33 kills and seven aces on offence, in addition to eight stuff blocks, four assisted blocks, and 51 digs on defence. She registered a 36 per cent killing rate, 31 per cent efficiency and a 2.01 serve receive ratio.
 
Iannotti racked up 56 kills and five aces, to go along with four blocks, two assisted blocks and 33 digs. She had a 37 kill percentage and a 22 per cent efficiency with a 1.62 serve receive.
 
Newcomer Rachel Leduc, a 20-year-old Montrealer who transferred from Camosun College in Victoria, B.C., had 26 kills, four aces, 18 digs, six blocks and three assisted blocks.
 
The preseason schedule continues next weekend in Kingston, where McGill is slated to play Queen's on Friday (Sept. 30) and Toronto Metropolitan University, formerly known as Ryerson, on Saturday. The medal round is slated for Sunday.

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Earl Zukerman
Sports Information Officer
Athletics & Recreation
McGill University
514-398-7012 (Tel.)
www.mcgillathletics.ca
earl.zukerman@mcgill.ca