by KAMLOOPS — An Olds College Bronco is joining the WolfPack and bringing with him a solid set of skills to ignite the men’s volleyball team.
Thundersky WalkingBear (Cree), an outside hitter for the college’s Men’s Volleyball Broncos, is bringing his high level of skills to Thompson Rivers University (TRU).
WolfPack Men’s Volleyball Coach Pat Hennelly described the 6-3 WalkingBear as a big addition to the program.
“We were looking for some veteran help and Thundersky will certainly provide that. Thundersky has excellent ball control, a strong net presence and can put up numbers offensively,” he said.
Prior to playing with the Olds College Broncos, WalkingBear was with the 16-18 U Huskie Volleyball Club in Saskatoon. He was on the gold-winning Team Saskatchewan in the 2017-18 North American Indigenous Games and was named U18 male beach athlete of the year.
In his first year of the men’s Alberta College Athletic Conference (ACAC), Thundersky was 2018-19 men’s volleyball player of the year and MVP for Olds College, as well as male rookie of the year. In his second ACAC year, he was the 2019-20 men’s volleyball player of the year for Olds and was the ACAC men’s all conference outside hitter (southern division). He was also named player of the game numerous times.
“His skill, both at the net and in the back court, will have an immediate impact with our program. Thundersky was an all-star in the competitive ACAC conference and comes from a program with an excellent coach in Ryan Marsden. Thundersky has the skills we needed to add to our program going into the 2021 season,” Hennelly said.
Marsden is glad to see WalkingBear going further as a volleyball player as well as continuing his education after graduating with a business in sports management diploma from Olds.
“It has been a complete pleasure to work with T-sky over the last three seasons. He has been instrumental in our program and in us becoming competitive with the best teams in the league. Thundersky is a two-time team MVP as well as rookie of the year. He was an ACAC all star last year as well. Thundersky will most definitely make an impact for the WolfPack program and we look forward to cheering him on,” Marsden said.
WalkingBear said coming to TRU is the next step in moving forward.
“I selected TRU because my program transferred from Olds and I would like to better or continue my education. As well, I am very interested in the TRU Men’s Volleyball WolfPack program.”
