Sunshine Coast athletes returned home after an impressive showing at the BC Summer Games last week in Surrey.
The athletes competed for Zone 5 in the event held every two years, attracting more than 2,300 participants.
Devon May, along with her partner Megan Chan of Vancouver, battled the elements and strong competition to take the gold medal in U17 girls' beach volleyball.
The team went undefeated in the competition.
After dropping the first set of the gold medal match, the girls came back with a convincing win in the second set and wrapped it up nicely in the third.
Devon has been commuting at least four times weekly to Vancouver throughout the year to train with her beach club Sideout and to play on a high performance U18 indoor team.
Zoey Schutz, Tessa May (Devon's sister), Talia Barnum and Stephanie Slingerland were among the 12 athletes selected for the U15 indoor volleyball team.
The two days of preliminary games were highlighted by enthusiastic team spirit and great individual efforts by all players. The final game saw the Zone 5 team in a rematch against Zone 3 (Fraser Valley) to whom they lost the previous day.
The players stepped up to the challenge and this time dominated game play with a powerful front row offence and a solid performance on defence.
The match was finished in two games and the Zone 5 team donned their gold medals.
On the wrestling mat, Gibsons Alex Ratcliff, a stand-out with the Elphinstone Secondary School team, took gold in the girls' 70 kg division. In baseball, Matt Gopp, who was originally chosen as an alternate to train with the Zone 5 team but wasn't going to play, got a last minute request (at midnight) to replace an injured player and to join the team the next day. That good fortune paid off for Matt as the team won the gold medal with an 8-1 win in the final.
Matt Whittall placed fifth as part of the U15 indoor volleyball team, Morgan Dear finished sixth in the girls' one metre and three metre diving events and Halfmoon Bay's Avery Struck finished 11th in the girls' golf competition.
Zone 5 finished third overall in the medal count with a total of 82 medals.
The BC Games cauldron will be lit again in 2014 in Mission for the BC Winter Games and in Nanaimo for the BC Summer Games.
