Canada upsets Italy, advances to Olympic volleyball quarter-finals
Will play Russia in the quarter-finals Wednesday
Canada's men's volleyball team came to Rio wanting to see how they'd stack up against the world's best.
Ranked 12th in the world, the underdog Canadian team has been keeping up so far.
Tyler Sanders hit the winning ace to lift Canada into the quarter-finals at the Olympic Games with a 3-1 victory over No. 4 Italy. Set scores were 25-23, 25-17, 16-25 and 25-21 in the final preliminary-round game for both teams.
"Our objective is just to keep going," said Canadian spiker Gavin Schmitt. "We want a medal, we are not here for doing tourism.
"We are going to see how far we can go."
The win, Canada's first over Italy in men's volleyball in 16 matches, put the Canadians into second place in Pool A with nine points. Canada will play Russia in the quarters on Wednesday.
Canada got off to a stunning start at the Olympic tournament with a straight sets win over No. 5 United States. The Canadians lost 3-1 to Brazil and 3-0 to France before downing Mexico 3-0 in their other preliminary-round games.
Italy was undefeated in its first four matches in Rio. The Italians finish atop Pool A with 12 points.
France played top-ranked Brazil later Monday. The match decided who Canada will play in the quarter-finals.
"It is nice to beat a really good team as Italy," said spiker Frederic Winters. "We could control our destiny with a win so it was a lot of pressure for us. And they had no pressure, because they won the group. But we played really well and focused, mainly in the first and second set."
By The Canadian Press