NAIT Golfer and setter Mason Gorski finishing college career with prestigious tournament
In February 2024, Mason Gorski and 18 NAIT men’s volleyball teammates made history at Camosun College in Victoria, B.C. For the first time – 47 years since its inaugural season – the team won the Canadian Collegiate Athletic Association (CCAA) championship.
“That was a special year,” recalls the Finance student and three-year Ook, including two with the golf team.
In its own way, this year will be special, too.
From March 11 to 14, NAIT will host the CCAA men’s volleyball championship for the first time, bringing seven other teams from across Canada to Edmonton. The Ooks start by facing Quebec’s Titans de Limoilou, whom they swept in three to win that 2024 final.
Gorski, a setter, isn’t focusing exclusively on that. Partly, he’s given to introspection. The tournament is a turning point; like 10 of his teammates, it’s Gorski’s last year as an Ook.
He’s thinking about what brought him here, what being on the team and at NAIT has meant to him, and where it may lead next. It almost doesn’t matter how the tournament ends, Gorski muses.
Or so he muses for a minute, at least.
“I’m very competitive,” he says. “I do want to win more than anything.”
Get tickets to the 2026 CCAA Volleyball Championship at NAIT, March 11 - 14
“Another level to get to”
Gorski’s desire to succeed is obvious in how he has conducted himself as a student-athlete. After starting at another Edmonton post-secondary institute in 2020, he transferred to NAIT when close friends left the team two seasons later. He’d heard good things about being an Ook, and wasn’t ready to quit.
“I still have another level to get to,” Gorski thought.
That involved more than he’d expected. In 2023-24, NAIT rejoined Alberta Colleges Athletic Conference (ACAC) golf. Gorski made the team, and the national tournaments in 2024 and 2025. Then, each fall, he traded golf cleats for court shoes when volleyball started.
“Being in two sports allowed me to see how good my time management has to be,” says Gorski. “I've really made it a priority that, when I'm not playing volleyball or golf, I have to be doing school. And when I'm not doing school, it's making sure that my body is ready [for] either volleyball or golf.”
Gorski acknowledges he had help. Though his instructors never gave him unfair advantages, they accommodated his needs, he says.
Then there was the coaching staff and athletic therapists. Now 23 years old, Gorski was warned that five years of college-level volleyball could leave his body feeling like a ball that had been spiked too many times.
“But, honestly, this is the best my body’s felt,” he says.
Gorski feels so good that he’s still not ready to quit. He’s planning a run at going pro. NAIT coaches have connections to agents, he says, and previous players have already travelled that path.
“Coming here has opened up that opportunity to me,” says Gorski. “It was probably the best switch I could have made.”
Not making predictions
As for the national tournament, Gorski adds, “having this opportunity is just another kind of gift.”
And playing in their own freshly renovated gymnasium is like the pretty bow on top.
“We have three games in our home gym with our fans,” he says. “It’s going to be unreal.”
Earning a wildcard spot for hosting, the Ooks will enter the tournament as second-place finishers in the ACAC north division. That was the situation in 2024, too – before that national win. (Also to their advantage, the Ooks are undefeated at home, holding a 10-0 record in the NAIT gymnasium.)
But Gorski isn’t making any predictions.
He does know, however, that he’s leaving NAIT more mature than when he arrived, pushed by coaches to grow as a person as well as an athlete. He knows he’ll have lifelong friends among his teammates. He knows he’s pretty much unbeatable at time management.
Most of all, perhaps, Gorski knows how grateful he’ll be when he has time to sit and look back on it all. “You can't ask for a better way to end your senior year,” he says.
Or could you, with a national title on the line? If so, Gorski isn’t biting.
“As long as we give our absolute best,” he says. “I will be happy.”
National volleyball comes to NAIT
March 11 - 14
NAIT Gymnasium, Main Campus, 11762 - 106 St.
Various times
For the first time, NAIT will host the Canadian Collegiate Athletic Association men’s volleyball championship, bringing seven of the best teams from across the country to compete in the newly renovated gymnasium.
“Hosting a national championship at NAIT is a significant achievement for our institution and our volleyball program,” said Jordan Richey, director of Athletics and Recreation.
“Bringing the country’s best to our campus is a powerful recognition that NAIT and Edmonton are leading destinations for major national sporting events.”
As host, the NAIT men’s team will be part of the action.
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