The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

Sports Oakville Beaver SPORTS EDITOR: JON KUIPERIJ Phone 905-845-3824 (ext. 255) Fax 905-337-5567 email sports@oakvillebeaver.com · FRIDAY, DECEMBER 1, 2006 36 HIGH-FLYING HAWKS: The E.J. James Hawks girls' volleyball team displays the East Halton and Halton finalist pennants it earned during the elementary school playoffs. E.J. James surprises with Halton final showing By Herb Garbutt OAKVILLE BEAVER STAFF The E.J. James Hawks soared past one volleyball power but couldn't continue their upset run in the Halton elementary school girls' final. The Hawks played the spoiler role by knocking off the Centennial Chargers, winners of four of the last six Halton titles, 25-20 in Tuesday's semifinal at E.C. Drury High School in Milton. However, they faced an even more formidable foe in the championship game: the Stewarttown Stingers, who scored a 25-19, 25-14 victory to claim the regional title. The Stingers had lost just one match all season and that came in the Provincial Cup, an Ontario-wide tournament of the best school teams. And the Stingers quickly showed what they are capable of as they jumped out to a 7-0 lead in the opening game. Stewarttown coach Kevin Hughes had anticipated a rematch with Centennial, the team the Stingers beat by only two points in the deciding game of the North Halton final. However, he knew enough not to take the Hawks lightly. "They beat Centennial so we knew they were a good team," Hughes said. And the Hawks showed that as they battled back from the early deficit with a five-point run of their own. It continued that way for much of the opening game. At one point, the Stingers seemed poised to run away with it at 20-13 but once again the Hawks fought back to narrow the margin to 21-18. Stewarttown used its strong play at the net, both blocking and hitting, to close the game. "The girls do that a lot. They dig themselves into a hole and then climb out," said Hawks' co-coach Cliff Britton. "They like to give us more grey hair." While the coaches might have been sweating out the final, the players weren't. "They remained calm on the court and all the girls on the bench were giving them a lot of support and that seemed to be helping them out," said Hawks' cocoach Jerry Burlington. Nicole Gualtieri helped the Hawks out with strong serves while setter Kirsten French helped set up the attack. Jessica Henry, moving into the Hawks' newly created role of libero (a backcourt defensive specialist) also played an important role against the strong-hitting Stingers squad. E.J. James continued to trade points with the Stingers in the early part of the second game but Stewarttown pulled away by taking nine of 11 points to take a commanding 21-11 advantage. This time they wouldn't let the Hawks get back in the game. E.J. James posted a 4-2 mark in round-robin play, splitting with Stewarttown (15-20, 20-7) and Kilbride (20-15, 7-20) while sweeping Pineland (20-6, 20-11). River Oaks also reached the semifinals with a 4-2 mark. It split with Centennial (18-20, 22-20) and Rolling Meadows (8-20, 20-17), also sweeping C.R. Beaudoin (20-17, 20-4). However, River Oaks fell to Stewarttown 25-18 in the semis. Know your limit, play within it!