East LA Grinds Out Five-Set Thriller Against Long Beach on Sophomore Night

by Cerwin D Haynes

(photos by Sophia Priebe and Mario Villegas)

After losing last Friday at Cerritos, East LA College women's volleyball - despite their best season ever - was up against the proverbial wall in terms of playoffs outlook. The Falcons  - a half game behind ELAC for fifth in South Coast Conference standings - own the tiebreaker over ELAC by sweeping the season series. Plus Cerritos is directly behind East in the RPI rankings; all said, the Huskies, who are looking lower-seed playoff positioning, need to keep the Falcons from overtaking them and pushing them further onto the dreaded playoff bubble.

In short, East LA (State rank #25) needed one more win against a good conference opponent to not lose ground in the final standings and for playoffs' outlook. Said opportunity presented itself tonight as the Huskies hosted the #16-ranked Vikings of Long Beach City College, a team which suffered its first lost to ELAC when the Pack beat the Vikings in impressive fashion at Long beach back on October 6. A huge setting for ELAC's Sophomore Night as the Huskies looked to close out their regular season with a win.

Midway through the fourth set, it looked like LBCC would exact revenge on the home Green as the visitors, up 2-1 in the match, were leading 14-12. But the Pack (21-9, 9-7 SCC) rallied back to take set #4, and then eeked out the deciding frame to beat Long Beach City (17-4, 11-4) 3-2. Sophomore OH Roselia Cazares led all players with 27 kills (29 points), making her case for All-SCC honors as she attacked from all over the court. Sophomore MB Kiara Davis had the team's best kill percentage of the night at .455 (13 kills, 3 errors in 22 attempts), coming alive midway through the fourth set as the Huskies went on a 13-4 run to reverse an 4-11 deficit into a 17-15 lead.

The Vikings started the game by taking the first set, as the Huskies kept nipping at LBCC's leads but could never come closer than being down by two. The second set saw more of the same, except when Long Beach went up 23-18, that's when ELAC finally made their move and caught up to the visiting Vikings with their first successful rally. ELAC scored six points in a row, culminating on a kill by Cazares to take a 24-23 lead. Sophomore LB Jessica Apodaca, whose serves during the run kept LBCC off-balance, then hit a serve just outside the right court line for an error. But ELAC would close it out on consecutive kills by sophomore S Yarexy Luna and Cazares to tie the game at 1. 

Long Beach exerted more control in the third set, with a few controvesial calls going against the Pack seemed to get under their skin a bit. The Vikings took advantage to sail to a 15-25 set win to go up 2-1 - and for awhile it looked like Long beach would not let up the momentum as they opened an 4-11 lead in the fourth set. And that's when ELAC mounted its second serious rally.

• Two kills by Davis and Cazares cut the deficit to 11-6. Followed by a service error by Jacqueline Alvarez to give a point to the Vikings.
• Then, a pair of Alejandra Larios kills mixed in with a rare stretch of attack errors by Long Beach helped the Huskies close within two, 11-13.
• After trading kills to get the score to 12-14, East scored five in a row on four kills and another Vikings attack error.

ELAC took a 17-14 lead, and would then outscore LBCC 8-5 to take the critical set #4.

Onto the tiebreaking set, both teams were back and forth as the set would ultimately be tied 9-9. Larios then rose to the occassion again with another kill, and two more attack errors by the Vikings saw ELAC go up 12-9. After a Beach timeout, both teams volleyed off ELAC's serve but sophomore OH Caroline Wong - steady all game - mistimed an off-speed attack that failed to go over the net. Long Beach would get the serve, and immediately gave it back as Arianna Ortiz's serve sailed out of bounds to the right. At 13-10, both teams alternated the next three points which found ELAC at match point, 14-12. 

Next serve: both teams volley, but LBCC's Jordyn Hollins hits her attack into the net on the near side. The Pack sprints onto the court for a wild celebration as ELAC sweeps Long Beach, punctuating a hallmark regular season.

HUSKY BITS

• Roselia Cazares was likely game MVP. Not only did she lead with her striking, but she also had a team-high 10 digs. 
• The sophomore Larios - similar to temmate Davis - also seemed to come alive in the fourth set when the Huskies needed everything they had. She finished with nine kills (10 points).
• Davis was second on the team with 13 points scored.

UP NEXT:

While the Huskies are done for now, they'll be scoreboard-watching Friday as conference play concludes. They'll likely be keeping an eye particularly on Mt SAC at Cerritos - a Falcons win ties ELAC at 9-7 in the conference with Cerritos owning the tiebreaker.