Southern Section playoffs
Last week, we correctly predicted seven of the eight teams that would compete for the Southern Section Div. 1 title, missing only on San Marcos of Santa Barbara (28-3 in the regular season), which was relegated to Div. 2 in favor of Mater Dei, presumably because the Monarchs (28-11) played a much more difficult schedule.

The four-team pools, released on Saturday, looked like this:

Pool 1
Loyola
Newport Harbor
Huntington Beach
Mater Dei

Pool 2
Mira Costa
Corona del Mar
Tesoro
Edison (Huntington Beach)

After Wednesday’s first round, here is where we stand:

Pool 1
Loyola 1-0
Newport Harbor 1-0
Huntington Beach 0-1
Mater Dei 0-1

Pool 2
Mira Costa 1-0
Corona del Mar 1-0
Tesoro 0-1
Edison (Huntington Beach) 0-1
Each of the four matches was decided by 3-0 score, EXCEPT for Loyola/Huntington Beach, which went five. Sean Kelly, the nation’s top player, had eight kills in the final set to lift the Cubs to victory.

In the other Pool 1 match, Newport got 18 kills from Riggs Guy and 41 assists from Grayson Springborn in sweeping Mater Dei.

“We played really well on defense and in transition and had a real energy about our team,” noted coach Andrew Mabry.

In Pool 2, Mira Costa swept Tesoro behind 14 kills and .550 hitting from Victor Loiola. Freshman Mateo Fuerbringer added seven kills and four blocks.

“Mira Costa was focused and sharp as they executed the game plan to near perfection,” noted coach Greg Snyder. “Our service pressure has increased and our knowledge of Tesoro’s tendencies in most situations led to a very clean performance.”

Corona del Mar dominated Edison, 25-16, 25-20, 25-18. Sterling Foley had 15 kills to lead the way. Everett Welton added three aces and Ryan Gant had four blocks. The Sea Kings improved to 4-0 over the Chargers this season.

The next round of pool play is Tuesday.

Divisions 2 through 7, which is bracket play, held first-round matches yesterday (mostly, except for Div. 6, which starts bracket play on Saturday).

Division 2 is particularly loaded, with a total of five teams in the most recent statewide top 25 and four others in the South Region rankings among the 16 teams.

State No. 14 Santa Margarita Catholic swept Royal.

State No. 16 San Marcos of Santa Barbara turned back El Segundo 3-0. Jack Wilson and Mason Rice each had 17 kills for the victors.

State No. 17 Redondo Union, the top seed, did likewise to Pacifica Christian / Orange County of Newport Beach. The Sea Hawks, who played without standout libero Connor Bebe (torn ACL), got 23 assists and seven digs from Shane Friedman and six kills and five blocks from Vaughn Flaherty in the win.

State No. 19 Beckman faced tough Orange Lutheran and took care of business in four sets. The win extended the Patriots current streak to 16 straight matches. Luke Morrison led the way with 23 kills, four blocks, and three aces. Gavin Looney was also a big part of the win with 15 kills, two blocks, and an ace. 

“We made two big changes with our lineup 15 matches ago and it has paid off,” Beckman coach Darren McBain said before last night’s match. “We moved Jack Frame to the outside hitter spot from the middle and started running a modified 5-1 instead of a true 5-1, allowing another setter an opportunity to help run the offense. We feel good about where we are. We have options when things don’t go well now. Adjustments can be made.” 

“We have fine-tuned a lot of things over the course of the season, including our serving,” the coach added. “We feel confident that we can put pressure on anyone from the service line now.” 

No, 24 Dos Pueblos justified its first-time entry into the state top 25 by downing South Region No. 23 Upland on the road in three straight. Upland won D2 last year.

Great service pressure and an imposing block proved the difference for the Chargers, who got eight kills and eight digs from Micah Goss, five kills and seven blocks from Noah Grant, eight kills and four blocks from Jan Schmidtchen, and 29 assists and three blocks from Wyatt Silver.

South Region No. 21 Long Beach Wilson toppled St. Francis of La Cañada in four sets. The Bruins dropped the first set before rallying behind 46 assists from Shayne Galura and 39 combined kills from the trio of Will Morrison, Malek Turner, and Ian Nolte.

South Region No. 24 Santa Barbara beat Canyon of Anaheim in four. Two of the Dons’ set wins were by 28-26 scores.

South Region No. 25 Servite did likewise to Los Alamitos as Joaquin Rigdon had 29 assists and Eamon Rigdon and Quinn Rosencranz teamed for 18 kills.

Indeed, if you include state No. 7 San Clemente and No. 17 St. Margaret’s, which are playing in Div. 3, every higher-ranked Southern Section team in CIF State’s statewide and Region rankings prevailed in their first matches.

In other action Thursday from the state top 25…
No. 18 Cathedral Catholic and No. 25 Sanger both won in sweeps.

We have no report from the match between No. 13 Valley Christian of San Jose and Saint Ignatius College Prep. SICP has lost two-thirds of its matches this year but has several wins over ranked teams and could be dangerous in this spot.

Lastly, in the lone upset, newcomer Archbishop Mitty, No. 12 in the state this week, fell in five sets to WCAL rival and defending NorCal champion Saint Francis of Mountain View. Saint Francis won on its Senior Night, with senior Daniel Ventura (Libero), Ahmed Khan (OH), and Stefano Schiattone (OH) all making significant contributions. Senior Arif Mohamed (OH) is a pillar of the team's culture, according to coach Jonah Carson.

“Mitty is very physical and keeps coming at you with their attacking and blocking,” Carson said. “We played clean during some key moments to pull out the win. Our starting setter, Tim Cho, went down in the fifth with an ankle injury and freshman Cole Duque came in to close out the match.” 

The Lancer win means Saint Francis takes the WCAL round-robin title outright. League playoffs start next week to determine if the Lancers will be league champs outright or share the title with someone else.

Who’s Fab?
Earlier this week, Volleyball Magazine released its “Fab 50” list of the nation’s top senior boys volleyball players. California was very well represented, as you’d imagine. Half of the 50 were Californians.

Here are the Golden Staters, in the format that appeared at VolleyballMag.com:

Name, Height Position, High School, Club, College
Roan Alviar, 5-11, Libero, Bishop O’Dowd (Oakland, CA), Bay to Bay, Princeton
Jett Bathurst, 6-3, S-RS, Mira Costa (Manhattan Beach, CA), Team Rockstar, Loyola-Chicago
Ben Bray, 6-3, OH, Huntington Beach (CA), Pinnacle, Grand Canyon
Kaumana Carreira, 6-8, MB, Tesoro (Las Flores, CA), Balboa Bay, Stanford
Zach Chapin, 6-0, Libero, Mira Costa (Manhattan Beach, CA), Rockstar, Pepperdine
Christian Connell, 6-5, OH, Torrey Pines (San Diego, CA), Wave, USC
Johnny Dykstra, 6-1 Libero, Mira Costa (Manhattan Beach, CA), MB Surf, USC
Sterling Foley, 6-6 OH, Corona del Mar (Newport Beach, CA), Balboa Bay, USC
Ryan Gant, 6-5, S, Corona del Mar (Newport Beach, CA), Rockstar, Stanford
Riggs Guy, 6-3, OH, Newport Harbor (Newport Beach, CA), Balboa Bay, UC Santa Barbara
Raglan Kear, 6-6, OH-RS, Santa Barbara (CA), Santa Barbara, UC Santa Barbara
Sean Kelly, 6-7, OH, Loyola (Los Angeles, CA), MB Surf, UCLA
Cameron Kosty, 6-4, S-RS, Bishop O’Dowd (Oakland, CA), Bay to Bay, UC Irvine
Victor Loiola, 6-4, OH, Mira Costa (Manhattan Beach, CA), MB Surf, Long Beach State
Victor Lowe, 6-5, S-RS, Harvard-Westlake (Los Angeles, CA), MB Surf, Hawaii
Ian Nolte, 6-5, OH, Wilson (Long Beach, CA), Team Rock Star, Ohio State
Jake Pazanti, 6-3, S, Huntington Beach (CA), Pinnacle, Long Beach State
Eamon Rigdon, 6-6, RS-OH, Servite (Anaheim, CA), Pulse, USC
Tyler Robinson, 6-8 MB, Mater Dei (Santa Ana, CA), Rockstar, USC
Ethan Saint, 6-3, RS-OH, Santa Margarita (Rancho Santa Margarita, CA), Balboa Bay, UCSB
Caleb Sapp, 6-8, RS, Claremont (Upland, CA), Balboa Bay, UCLA
Kai Schmitt, 6-1, Libero, San Clemente (CA), Balboa Bay, Stanford
Trent Taliaferro, 6-5, S, J Serra (San Juan Capistrano, CA), 949, UCLA
Parker Tomkinson, 6-10, MB, Carlsbad (CA), Wave, USC
Reed Wainwright, 6-7, MB, St. Margaret’s (San Juan Capistrano, CA), Balboa Bay, Stanford

Kelly was named the top senior in the country.

Eye on you!
Volleyball Magazine, in the same article, listed 25 underclassmen to watch.

Here are the 11 from California on that list:

Name, Height, Position, Year, High School, Club, College Commit (if known)
Grayson Bradford, 6-9, RS-OH, Jr., Crespi (Encino, CA), MB Surf, Princeton
Kale Cochran, 6-7, OH, Jr., Whitney (Rocklin, CA), MVVC, USC
Jackson Cryst, 6-10, MB, Jr., Millikan (Long Beach CA), Pinnacle, Unknown
Noah Douphner, 6-5, OH-RS, Jr., West Ranch (Valencia, CA), SC Legends, Unknown
Blake Fahlbusch, 6-7, OH, Soph., Loyola (Los Angeles, CA), MB Surf, Unknown
Thatcher Fahlbusch, 6-6, OH, Jr., Mira Costa (Manhattan Beach, CA), Rockstar, Unknown
Declan Flanagan, 6-7, OH, Soph., Torrey Pines (San Diego, CA), Coast, Unknown
Cooper Keane, 6-6, RS-OH, Jr., Mira Costa (Manhattan Beach, CA), Rock Star, USC
Jack Loper, 6-5, OH, Jr., San Clemente (CA), Wave, Stanford
Roman Payne, 6-10, MB, Jr., Carlsbad (CA), Coast, Hawai’i
Marek Turner, 6-5, RS Jr., Wilson (Long Beach, CA), Rockstar, UCLA 

According to MaxPreps…
Next week, we will produce our own list, but here are the season stats leaders according to MaxPreps:

Kills
707 -- Tom Altankhuvag, Eagle Rock

Aces
127 – Brad Chier, Victory Christian Academy

Blocks
224 – Jaeden Brown, Sweetwater

Assists
1,171 – Elijah Savala, River Valley

Digs
676 – Grerardo Diaz, Calexico

News and notes

Torrey Pines won seven matches last weekend to take the Redondo/Mira Costa tournament. The Falcons defeated San Marcos of Santa Barbara in a semifinal and host Redondo Union in the championship match. Co-host Mira Costa did not play its varsity in the event…

***

San Dieguito Academy played in the West Coast Challenge Tournament this past weekend and made it to the semifinals, registering big wins over La Jolla, Otay Ranch, and Poway. The Mustangs lost to Scripps Ranch in the semifinals. Eastlake won the event.

San Dieguito had two players really standout in its five-set Friday pool play win over La Jolla: 6-4 S/RS Stevie Olson recorded a triple-double with 11 kills, 22 assists, and 10 digs. He fell three blocks short of the “impossible” quad-dub. Libero Henry Wegener also shined with a season-high 30 digs.

***

Jesuit, after winning league again, now sets its sights on a third straight sac-Joaquin Section title

Jesuit of Carmichael won its sixth consecutive Delta League Championship.  The Marauders have not lost a league match since March 14, 2019, when they lost to Elk Grove in 3 sets.  Since then, Sara Marks’ team has rolled off 50 consecutive league match victories. No. 3 in the North Region rankings, the Marauders also are two-time defending Sac-Joaquin Section Championships.

***

The Bishop's School is 25-9 to conclude the regular season. The Knights are very young, with a starting eight that includes four freshmen and two sophomores. Sophomore Giles Beamer and freshmen Logan Yockey, Hudson Yockey, and Will Denning were all named on the AVCA and JVA watch lists.

***

Temple City took time to celebrate its wild card win after a five-year playoff drought came to an end

After a five-year playoff drought, Temple City made the Wild Card round in Div. 5 and edged Canyon of Canyon Country in five to make the main draw. The Rams, who fell in four to Village Christian in the first round yesterday, were led all year by Damien Lessard, Mathew Kong, and Timothy Hinckley.