NAVC U18 Griffins Coaching Staff

Austin Hinchey is a 23 year old business degree student in his final year of finance.  He has been Captain of Canada’s Sitting Volleyball Team for the past 7 years, and is currently trying to qualify for the 2016 Paralympics in Rio de Janeiro. He has represented Canada internationally at numerous events, recently won a Para-Pan Am bronze medal in Toronto as well as in 2011, and competed at the 2010 world championships. Austin lived in Vancouver for the past two years where he was a setter for the University of British Columbia men’s varsity team. Prior to UBC, Austin was a setter and captain for all three years at NAIT He won the D.M. Memorial Award in his first season, and the Silver Torch Award for team MVP in his third season. Austin won 3 Provincial gold medals and 1silver during his four years with NAVC. He was also recognized as a provincial all-star in his U18 and U21 seasons. Austin was co-captain of the U16 Provincial Team and attended Ross Sheppard High School in Edmonton where he won the coveted Edmonton and area High School Volleyball All-star Award.

Since 2011, Austin has been a Sport Canada Carded Athlete and sponsored Athlete by RE7 Recovery Drink. Austin was selected as part of CIBC Team Next which is a team of Canadian high performance athletes under a three year sponsorship program. The 67 athletes in the program are given support on their road to the 2015 Toronto Pan American/Para-Pan Am Games and 2016 Olympics/Paralympics in Rio De Janeiro. 

Austin’s coaching experience includes Head Coach of SIDEOUT Beach Club. He was Assistant Coach of the U17 Nooks Boys team in 2012 and has coached numerous summer camps over the past 5 years (Sylvan Lake VC, Jasper VC, UBC Atomic, NAIT VC, Grant MacEwan VC, Pursuit VC, and private sessional beach coaching). Austin has also guest coached and aided with position specific coaching for club teams, and has spoken at events as an inspirational speaker. Austin is currently pursuing his coaching certifications.

Greg Gulash is going into his 3rd season as Nait's Men's assistant coach. Last year Nait finished 3rd at provincials. Greg played his 5 years at Nait as a Libero and served as captain in his last year. He has previously been a head coach of three U18 men's teams. Greg has also worked as an individual coach for Aspire for the last year, as well as running several camps for Grassroot Volleyball. Greg served as a mentor coach for our U13 team last year. Greg has also served as a drill coach for the U16, U17 Men's Alberta teams, and U17 Women's Alberta team as well as a drill coach for the Western Canada summer games Men's Beach team.

Zach joins NAVC having played 4 years for MacEwan University and 1 year for Mount Royal University.  He has coached the 2014 Team Alberta U16 boys beach volleyball, 2015 Team Alberta U18 boys beach volleyball and the 2015 Western Canada summer games Team Alberta beach volleyball team.  Zach has also been a director of the Volleyball Alberta youth beach volleyball league for the last two years.  He is currently an assistant coach for Bev Facey senior girls volleyball team.