Quebec Volleyball needs you

Canadian volleyball dudes need you

Buy a tee from these guys. Seriously.

Here on Venice Beach, we walk as far as the sand to find some volleyball action — unlike a certain Canadian team we know whose far more adventuresome travel urge is taking them to Europe. They hope. These guys like to visit new places, meet new faces, spike new balls. They need your help to go play in France.

Meet middle hitter Nick Gagnon and the Volontaires from Cégep de Sherbrooke. What’s a cégep? Kinda like our junior colleges. Everyone in Quebec attends a cégep before enrolling in university.

The Volontaires are a AAA college league team in Quebec — just east of Montréal, just north of Vermont. Nick reached out to ask for our help — and yours.

These guys are revved and ready to rock in three exhibition games in Paris this winter, determined to show Ile-de-France just how strong and stealthy the Québécois can be.

They’re selling tees to finance their trip. Nick is passing the virtual hat in the volleyball community here in Venice and across the USA from up where it’s most likely already snowing like a bastard. The Vols can’t wash your car, but they will send you a shirt. A nice shirt.

Sherbrooke to Paris And here’s what it looks like, only $15. Each sale helps coach Pascal Boulanger and the guys further their cause of kicking French butt in their most excellent volleyball event of the year, December 28 through January 7. Not that the Parisian adventure is distracting the Vols from nailing a slot in Quebec’s finals and a berth in the Canadian national championships. But they will take on France’s top three teams.

That includes the bad boys from Plessis-Robinson, France’s #1 team. The Vols are psyched. “We finished third in the provincial championship last year. We’re a combative team,” says Nick, “we’ve got strong team spirit and we always give our max on the court.”

Hey, I bought a shirt. $15 to help ignite some idealism? Sure. “We want to raise the skill level of every player, reinforce our team spirit and discover a new country,” says Nick.

Cégep de Sherbrooke Volontaires Besides, they really want to inflict some damage in a nation where the men all look like John Kerry. Can you blame ‘em? (Kidding.)