UBC and Canada's dominant volleyball spiker during the '60s and '70s, Witzke is an inductee in Canada's Volleyball Hall of Fame and UBC's Hall of Fame as a member of the 66/67 UBC team. Providing elite power hitting for several champion UBC volleyball teams as well as for Canada, he also competed on UBC' s track team winning gold in the shot put and for UBC's varsity eight-oared crew. He graduated from UBC with an MBA degree in 1971.
Ken Witzke was acknowledged during his volleyball career as Canada’s strongest, most dominant spiker and among the elite power hitters in the world. And while at UBC from 1963 through 1969 was very much part of a historic era with respect to volleyball in Canada.
Witzke first appeared on UBC’s athletic scene as a member of UBC’s 1963/64 volleyball team under coach Les Heron. This team won the Western Canadian University Championship going undefeated in the round-robin tournament.
In 1965/66 Witzke was a key starter on the UBC team that won the B.C. Open Championship again going undefeated through the tournament. The 6’2” 210 pound Witzke was also the MVP of the ’66 Canadian Junior Championships while with the T-Birds. He was, along with his UBC teammates, now set to embark upon a season (66/67) that would revolutionize the game of volleyball in Canada.
1967 started with Witzke and the Thunderbirds winning the Western Canadian University volleyball title then subsequently forming the starting nucleus that would represent B.C. and win gold at the first ever Canada Winter Games in Quebec. These six Thunderbirds then returned to lead UBC to the Western Canadian Open Championship. The next month, March of ’67, UBC would win the first Canadian University (CIAU) volleyball championship as well as the Canadian Junior (under 21) title. These championships saw three tournaments held during a four day period; Canadian University, National Junior and Senior Open – a period of time over which UBC’s stars Witzke and Mike Rockwell played an amazing 56 games of volleyball. This was even more remarkable in that Witzke was playing with two cracked ribs and Rockwell with a broken nose.
Witzke’s UBC teammate for many of these years, Dale Ohman, outlined what Witzke brought to the court for UBC: "Ken was a stallion. He was feared. People were scared of him because he was so strong physically. With his long arms, strong wrists, thick thighs and great vertical jump he hit a heavy ball, one that could go right through the block." His spiking would " . . . waste guys away all the time" remembers Ohman.
It was, however, UBC’s representing of Canada at the 1967 World Student Games in Tokyo that would result in Witzke and his teammates ultimately leaving a major stamp on the game in Canada. It was there they were exposed to the new Asian style of volleyball, one which had not been seen before in the West and that UBC would bring back to Canada and North America.
This style became the standard for how the sport was to be played and watched to this day. Witzke remembers that 1967 renaissance; "From that point on the multiple attack has been used here. We were the pioneers of that in Canada. We can think of ourselves as a footnote in history."
Both before and after adopting the Asian style the Thunderbirds often had their way with both Canadian and US NCAA competition. One UBC player remembers playing alongside Witzke; when he hit the ball . . . "it was fun times just watching the destruction." Witzke continued to be the "muscle on the team" in his fifth year 68/69, leading UBC to tournament victories. It was in ’69 he competed in his second World Student Games and in ’71 he was the starting power hitter for Canada at the PanAm Games in Cali, Columbia.
While with the UBC volleyball team for five years over which time he played a significant role in six Western Canadian and National titles, Witzke also took time out to compete on the Thunderbird track team. In March of 1969 at the Western Canadian university track and field championships in Winnipeg, he won gold in the shot-put leading UBC to the championship, Witzke’s seventh such title.
With his oar-breaking strength he was also a member of the UBC varsity eight-oared crew, one which came third at the ’68 Olympic trials in Ontario. According to a fellow rower, if Witzke had instead rowed with UBC’s pairs, for which he was more than qualified and who did eventually represent Canada, he would have been a ’68 Olympian.
Following his career at UBC the 1969 Applied Science graduate and 1971 UBC MBA graduate continued to play club volleyball (three consecutive national silver medals) as well as serve as assistant coach with the Vancouver Chimos women’s team. In 1977/78 he was head coach of the UBC Thunderbird men’s team.
Today, living in his hometown of Winfield B.C., Witzke is a cherry farmer engaged in trade missions and exchanges with China and its emerging fruit industry. It has been his science and marketing expertise that has helped revolutionize the fruit industry in the Okanagan. In June 2005 he was inducted into the Canadian Volleyball Hall of Fame.
Researched and written by Fred Hume, UBC Athletics Historian
