Oilers outlast Corona del Mar
Rick Devereux
The coastline of Corona del Mar and Huntington Beach have spectacular
beaches with extraordinary waves that ebb and flow from the sand to
the ocean.
The Division I championship match between the Corona del Mar High
boys volleyball team and Huntington Beach in the Orange County
championships at Edison High Monday was spectacular with momentum
that ebbed and flowed from one team to the other.
Even though CdM lost the best-of-three match, 25-27, 25-23, 15-10,
there was a positive feeling on the Sea Kings’ sideline.
“We played with a lot of heart throughout this whole tournament,”
Coach Steve Conti said. “There were times where we could have gotten
down, but we kept on fighting.”
There were 26 ties and 13 lead changes in the three games.
“That’s how we are,” senior Tom Welch said. “We’re little and
scrappy. We work extremely hard in practice and I think that shows in
our matches.”
The first game was a war of determination. The largest lead CdM
would enjoy was 12-9, while the Oilers’ biggest cushion was 23-20.
The Sea Kings battled back with a back-row kill by senior Kevin
Welch to make it 23-21 and Huntington’s fifth net violation of the
game closed the gap to one point. A kill by Oiler senior outside
hitter Danny Laflar gave Huntington Beach a game-point opportunity,
but a Kevin Welch kill and an illegal contact by the Oilers tied the
game at 24-24.
The Oilers retook the lead on middle blocker Rory Jones’ kill, but
CdM scored twice on Huntington hitting errors for a 26-25 advantage
and Kevin Welch won a joust for the game-winner.
The second game was as close as the first, with neither team
grabbing a lead larger than the Oilers’ 15-11 edge.
But, just as in the first game, the lead did not last long as the
Sea Kings scored on kills by Ted Slaughter and Tom Welch as well as
two hitting errors on Huntington Beach to tie the game, 15-15.
CdM eventually took leads at 22-21 and 23-22, but the Oilers
scored the final three points of the game on kills by Trey Valbuena,
Laflar and Jones.
The third game took a different tone than the first two as
Huntington scored six straight points to take a 7-2 lead. The Oilers’
passing sharpened in the final game, creating better offensive
attacks.
“We knew we fell apart in the first two games,” Huntington Beach
setter Ryan Boyce said. “We knew that if we could get our passing
together, we could beat these guys.”
When a CdM hitting error made the score 11-4, Conti called a
timeout. It looked bleak for the Sea Kings to muster any type of
sustained run, but CdM came out of the break and scored four points
to make it 11-8 and forced Huntington to call a timeout.
“Coach told us that we came too far in this tournament to lose
like this and to play with pride,” Kevin Welch said.
The three-point margin was as close as the Sea Kings could come,
but Conti was happy with the progress the team had made since last
week’s San Diego tournament of champions, where CdM finished 5-3.
“This is outstanding,” he said. “We gained a lot of valuable
experience in that tournament. I think the way we finished in San
Diego, not a lot of people thought we would do well here.”
The seesaw battle was not necessarily a question of which team had
better passing, hitting and serving.
The two teams play today at Huntington Beach in a nonleague match
at 6 p.m.
“We don’t have anything to hang our heads about,” Kevin Welch
said. “If anyone on our team is [upset] we can take it out on them in
the rematch.”
Kevin Welch, who had 10 kills and seven digs in the championship
match, was named to the all-tournament team.
Tom Welch led the Sea Kings with 13 kills and 11 digs against the
Oilers. Adam Smith finished with eight kills and seven digs while
Phil Bannon dished out 31 assists.
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