The Los Al Girls volleyball team opened their volleyball season with a businesslike and somewhat efficient sweep over Wilson, 25-22, 25-18, 25-14 Thursday evening at the Los Al High gym.
The Griffins showed plenty signs of why they earned the pre-season No. 1 ranking in the CIF Division 1-AA polls. They got good outside hitting from senior hitters Alijah Gunsaulus, Jaylen Villanueva and JoJo Schnabl and sophomore Crissy Jones showed strong blocking. But while they made some good passes, at times the seemed a little off , and it seemed that pure athleticism, and some Wilson mistakes, was winning the match as much as anything.
In other words, it was a typical season-opening game. “Yeah, we were a little bit too excited at the top and game one but we settled down for game two and game three.” Huber thought his bench players did well, making plays
Wilson stayed close in the first set, despite playing without star setter and hitter Rebecca Strehlow (the leading pre-season candidate for Moore League player of the Year) who is currently playing with the Under 21 U.S. National Beach volleyball team. Los Al on the other hand, was playing without setter Rachel Fattal, who can’t play games until after she returns from playing with the Us Jr National Water Polo team in Italy later this month. Los Al comes out ahead in that trade as coach Dave Huber can still insert three more top quality setters into his lineup.
Los Al displayed its depth early and often and Huber played around with some interesting combinations, including at one point having three defensive specialists on the court – which is a great option to have when those defensive specialists are Callie Taylor, Lindsay Lawmaster and Corrie Hunt.
Jones started all three games at middle, alternating with other middles Amy Armstrong and Ella Johnson. Junior outside hitter Cristina Maietta delivered some strong hits after entering the game to start the third set.
Statistically, Villanueva recorded 10 kills, and Jones added five kills and five blocks.
The always creative, noisy (and often quite obnoxious to opponents) Los Al fans were in mid-season form before the game even started. But even they couldn’t seem to raise the intensity level.
In earlier action, the Los Al JV team showed evidence that they should be a strong team this year and swept Wilson in two games. They were led by setter Sarah Metcalfe and left side hitter Jasmine Hogan.
The Los Al Freshman team fell in two games to the Wilson frosh-soph.
- Wilson Fights But Falls to Los Al – Gazette Sports
- Chris Tabolski’s SoCal Volleyball Report blog of the match.
- Los Alamitos Sweeps Wilson – VolleyballNow.com story
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