Vanguard battles, remains perfect

COSTA MESA — The Vanguard University Lions were put to the test on Tuesday night, but made a statement to the rest of the Golden State Athletic Conference: Don’t ever count them out.

The Vanguard women’s volleyball team, ranked No. 13 in the NAIA, remained undefeated, showing some fire in the third game to close out a 24-19, 25-19, 26-24 sweep of visiting Westmont.

The Lions (6-0) had established early momentum in the first two games and it looked as if they were headed to an easy win in the third game. However, that momentum was slowed early in the third with some mental mistakes and sloppy play at the net.

Westmont (6-5) proceeded to jump out to an 11-5 lead in the third game and forced first-year head coach and Newport Harbor alum Marissa Cothran to take a timeout.

The timeout apparently worked. Cothran and the Lions decided they would not let Warriors extend the match.

“We all said on the sidelines, ‘we are not losing this game,’ ” said Heather DeJongh, Vanguard’s junior outside hitter, who had a match-high 14 kills. “We were down seven points and it was really encouraging to see the fire we had to win.”

The Lions took that fire and came out with some big kills by DeJongh and middle blocker Shardai Sublett to make it 14-10. The Lions were starting to regain that early momentum and with the crowd getting behind them, there appeared to be no stopping their charge.

But the Warriors would not back down. They were determined to take it to a fourth game and answered every point to make it 20-15. However, that would be the last big lead of the game and match for Westmont.

The Lions went on a 7-2 run to tie it up at 22 and pushed for a third-game victory. The noise within Vanguard’s smaller arena, known as The Pit, enhanced the intensity of the game and intensified the play.

The two squads went kill for kill until freshman outside hitter Jamie Heenan, a Newport Harbor product, put the Lions up 25-24 with a huge cross-court kill. The Lions had match point service and then played it safe. They put the ball in the Warriors court where a Westmont mistake at the net gave the Lions a game-three win and a match victory.

“I think we did a great job of battling and coming back all night,” Cothran said. “We kept a great attitude tonight and that was our goal. We’ve been struggling a little bit with seeing individuals and we really needed to make sure we came out tonight and played like a team.”

Cothran was a standout at Newport Harbor High and a two time all-conference setter at Vanguard before joining the coaching staff. She took over the program this year after being an assistant coach for two years and the transition has helped produce a perfect record for the Lions so far.

The improvement in Cothran’s lineup was obvious on Tuesday night with several players involved in the conference-opening win.

Kelsey Wirt contributed nine kills and seven digs. Megan Walsh led all setters with 37 assists. Alexandra Griffiths dominated the back line with 12 digs and she also had four service aces.

“We can only get better from here,” DeJongh said after the match. “A lot of the times you play up to a team’s level and I am really excited to see how we will perform against some of the really good teams in our conference.”

The Lions will play their second conference match on Thursday night against fourth-ranked Biola at home at 7 p.m.