Lillian Li (Lo-Ellen Park Knights) and the Collège Notre-Dame Alouettes mixed doubles team of Chiana Rocca and Théo Lefebvre will be away from school from May 2nd to May 4th - which is not to say the troika will not still be learning.

The talented trio are representing SDSSAA hopes at the 2024 OFSAA Badminton Championships in Barrie, with Li having captured gold in Senior Girls play at the NOSSA Championships last week in Sault Ste Marie and Rocca-Lefebvre earning silver.

But given that all three are only 15 years old, it's fair to say that the inaugural trip to OFSAA is all about the experience.

"Our expectation is to try and learn as much as we can and make a big push next year," said Lefebvre, a grade 11 student at CND, his partner only in grade 10. "We want to really focus on how we can do as well as we can next year."

Last spring, Lefebvre teamed with partner Gabrielle Luoma to capture junior gold at NOSSA in a sport that only competes in the senior division at OFSAA. This time around, he circled back to a teammate that he had known from his pre-Covid days with the Sudbury Junior Badminton Club, even if the duo were not all that into tournament play at the time.

"This year, I've been practicing more with my partner, knowing what her style is so that we can cooperate with each other," said Lefebvre. It would actually take a little time to settle upon a defensive strategy that works for the two of them.

"At the beginning, we always had her (Rocca) at the front and me at the back," outlined Lefebvre. "We figured out that it made more sense to use both of our defensive abilities when we are on the defensive side of the birdie."

"At cities and NOSSA, we played sides when we lifted (cleared) the birdie - and we tried not to lift the birdie as much."

Caleb Lalonde of Champlain also hit the podium in the senior singles boys bracket, walking off with a bronze medal, with the Sudbury district claiming two of the five divisions at the junior level.

Nyah Robinson (St Charles - Girls Singles) and Audrey Pitre/Ashley Rancourt (Rivières-des-Francais - Girls Doubles) took first place in their respective groupings with Manu Patil (Lo-Ellen) finishing second only to Robinson.

Third place junior finishers from the area included Noah Fortin (Boys Singles) from Rivières-des-Francais (Noelville) along with the St Charles' boys doubles team of Brody Mabbott and Gabriel Larocque.

The Novice Division produced another four medals for the locals, with the most success coming in Boys Doubles as Lo-Ellen Park swept the top two placement thanks to Eric Huang/Ryan Corrigan (gold) and Daniel Kulik/Vishnu Nair (silver).

Blake Chenier of Horizon made it five gold medal honours for SDSSAA, besting the field in Novice Boys Singles play while Sophie Leveillée/Emma Jensen (Champlain) earned silver in Girls Doubles playdowns.

OFSAA play begins bright and early on Thursday morning with Lillian Li facing Nadine Buchanan (NCSSAA - National Capital - Ottawa) while Rocca and Lefebvre have drawn the duo of Grace Ming and Jason Liu from Toronto in their first round match.