ATHABASCA – A local athlete is looking forward to his Volleyball Alberta return following a successful first season with the program that saw his team finish in the middle of the provincial pack at Nationals.
Logan Boucher looks every bit the volleyball star he’s quickly becoming — the 6 foot, 6 inch tall Grade 11 student at Edwin Parr Composite School (EPC) didn’t pick up the sport until high school, but he’s taken to it like a fish to water since.
“Meeting all the new people, it’s been fun,” said Boucher, who made the U16 team in his Grade 10 season and will join the U17 squad this year. “Playing against all the different provinces and seeing how good they are compared to Alberta has been cool.”
Boucher plays middle blocker, often referred to as middle, meaning his height gets leveraged on both offence and defence. Despite his late start on the volleyball court, Boucher credited his prior experience playing other sports for helping his athleticism develop.
“I used to play soccer (and) basketball. I did swimming for a lot of years. I think it helped my vertical a lot,” said Boucher. “It’s good to just do a lot of things when you’re young so that you have the physical build to do what you want to do when you’re older.”
When he takes the court for Team Alberta during the Canada Cup, held in Calgary this year from July 24 to 28, Boucher said he’s eager to take away as much as possible from the experience.
“I want to have fun with it since it’s my last year. For sure get a lot out of training out of it, it’s two weeks of four-hour days so I’ll learn a lot,” said Boucher. “The first year was fun, it was a lot more learning because I was kind of newer and had only been playing volleyball a short amount of time.”
Outside of the provincial program, Boucher is planning to play his final season with the EPC Predators, as well as a club season in St. Albert — he made sure to thank his mom and dad for their support and car rides to the city — and he has his eyes set on university soon after.
“I’m mostly thinking of Alberta and B.C., B.C. also has a couple of good teams,” said Boucher, who listed the University of Alberta and the University of British Columbia as two possibilities.
Besides his natural predilection for the game, Boucher said he loves the sport because of its intensity and pace, which stood out to him as one of his favourite parts.
“It’s pretty similar to basketball but it’s a lot more tense,” he said. “The energy is probably the best out of any sport.”
