After claiming the 2014-15 OUA title, the University of Toronto Varsity Blues women's volleyball team has nothing but the highest expectations for themselves. Every step they must take; recruiting, training, executing on game day; they take with a certainty that excellence will follow.

This season, beyond those ordinary steps, the Varsity Blues program has added one more. An extraordinary additional step that would not only assist in providing team building and further exposure to excellent training, but also provide a glimpse of an entirely different system and a higher level of competition.

This season the Varsity Blues women's volleyball team traveled to Italy over the winter break to face off with three Italian club teams: Orago, Volleyro and Novara. These teams are part of a developmental system in Italy which sees high performance training for a sport as popular as volleyball begin at a young age. Youth clubs in Italy are considered some of the best in the world with the countries national teams, from under-16 to the senior national program, often ranking within the top five internationally. Additionally, the Italian professional leagues feature some of the best competitors from around the globe and are often regarded as the best the world has to offer.

"We had the opportunity to compete against teams at a very high level and to challenge ourselves," says Varsity Blues libero and co-captain Denise Wooding. "Not only do I think it helped us improve in the short term, but we also brought home with us a stronger idea of where we want to be and what we need to work on every day to get there."

Over the week-long tour, the Varsity Blues finished 2-2. The team opened the trip with a tough four-set loss to Volleyro (25-20, 16-25, 20-25, 22-25) in Rome but followed that up with back-to-back victories in Milan defeating Orago in straight sets (25-23, 25-23, 25-21) and Novarra in a four set contest (20-25, 26-24, 25-18, 25-12). To end the trip U of T returned to Rome to face off with Volleyro once again but fell in straight sets (17-25, 23-25, 21-25).

"It is always fun to compete at a high level but it was also great to see how much the people enjoyed and valued the sport of volleyball," said Wooding about the atmosphere surrounding the Blues trip. "There were huge stadiums where only volleyball is played, volleyball matches were playing on TV, and people on the streets would get excited when they saw "volleyball" on our jackets."

Beyond the competition, the Varsity Blues players also were able to take in several of the beautiful destinations found in Italy including outings to the famed Coliseum and Vatican.

"This was the first time our team had the opportunity to travel outside of Canada together," said Wooding. "When we weren't on the court we had time to walk around together and see the main sites in Rome, Milan and Florence and learn about the history and culture which is so rich there. Seeing the Coliseum and the Vatican was a once in a lifetime experience and I would love to go back to Rome in the future."

Now filled with motivation from their overseas experience the No. 4 ranked Varsity Blues will look to continue their dominance in the OUA following a strong first half to their season which sees them atop the OUA East standings with a perfect 9-0 record. With a few new tricks, Toronto will welcome cross-town rival York to the Goldring Centre for High Performance Sport tomorrow afternoon with first serve set for 1 p.m.
 

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