CERRITOS — A strong showing on both offense and defense was just not enough for West Ranch girls volleyball in Saturday’s CIF title match.
The Wildcats fell in the CIF Southern Section Division 2 championship battle to the Santa Margarita Eagles in a five-set match.
Santa Margarita won the match 26-28, 25-21, 25-23, 13-25, 15-11, behind the towering swing of Eagles’ 6-foot, 4-inch outside hitter Ireland Real. The Texas commit hammered in 28 kills, a block and five digs in the title match, including seven kills in both the second and third games.
“No matter who we’ve played this year, we’ve battled incredibly hard, and we haven’t backed down from a challenge,” West Ranch coach Jamey Ker said. “I think it’s probably our fourth or fifth set match, and all of those were against extremely talented teams, and it’s sort of been our war cry for a long time… I think that’s benefited us a lot in the late part of the season, and I even think it benefited us tonight, regardless of the loss, we still put up a hell of a fight, and I’m really proud of that.”
West Ranch (25-6) got a handful of blocks on Santa Margarita’s big outside hitter, and even held her to hitting just .175. There was no stopping Real when she got up and above the Wildcats’ block.
“It’s a long match, especially when you’re playing to five,” Ker said. “There’s going to be those ebbs and flows of us doing a really good job of putting the block up. You’re going to have, l one of the top players in the nation go off, and there are sometimes you just can’t do anything about that, and you just mitigate it as much as you possibly can. And I think that we did do that.”
Matching up on defense with Real was West Ranch setter Dani Clewis, a standout blocker. Clewis totaled five blocks, eight kills and 38 assists in one of her final high school matches before heading to Gonzaga volleyball.
Clewis has been a captain since her sophomore year, one season after she was hoisted into the varsity lineup unexpectedly, but the star setter never wearied.
“Everybody needs to try and model the way that Dani as an athlete,” Ker said. “I will talk about her forever. She will be one of those athletes that I refer back to when I’m trying to talk to a kid about how to lead properly. I’ve had a lot of really good players come through West Ranch, a lot of them girls that will end up playing professional volleyball, girls that are currently playing high-level Division 1 volleyball, girls that might play on the national team one day. It’s a lot of really good volleyball players. But I have not had a person who has more of an influence on the people around her than Dani has.”
Most lethal on the block was sophomore Gioia Nicolas-Piccolino, who totaled eight blocks and three kills.
“I’m really proud of Gioia,” Ker said. “This was by far the highest level of volleyball she has ever played. She’s only a sophomore and playing against girls who are going to Texas and girls who are going to Penn State. At her position, it’s a tall order, for sure, and especially for a sophomore. Her development over the course of the season has been really, really big.”
After the Wildcats rallied to take the opening deuce set, Santa Margarita turned up the heat and fired past West Ranch.
The Eagles were up big in set three and closing in on a comfortable victory before the Wildcats erupted on a 7-0 run and Santa Margarita’s 24-16 lead quickly flailed out thanks to some nice serving from opposite hitter Karleigh Larson.
West Ranch dropped the set after Real closed it out with a kill but the Wildcats still maintained the momentum heading into the fourth set, where the game got flipped upside down.
West Ranch got ahead early but exploded ahead later on an 11-1 run, where Joeleen Reynolds added two aces in her long serving run. The Wildcats snagged every bit of momentum heading into set five but the Eagles were quick to shake off the rust.
Santa Margarita’s serving carried the team early in the match, and came up clutch at the end of the match with three straight aces from libero Luna Magallenes. West Ranch chipped down a five-point gap but just couldn’t even the scores with Real closing out the day with back-to-back kills.
West Ranch was led by sophomore outside hitter Devyn Kobe, who shined just as bright as the Texas commit, with 24 kills, three blocks and a pair of aces.
“Devyn stepped up exactly how you hope your best player steps up,” Ker said. “She was pretty outstanding for us tonight, and it’s exciting that I have a sophomore who is not afraid of the bright lights in the way that she just was.”
The Wildcats will shift their focus to the state tournament, where Ker knows his team will have just as good of a shot at a title as in the CIF SS play, as the team has competed all year with Division 1 teams from all over the state. Ker believes his team still has momentum after the loss and will now aim to put the state championship plaque in the school’s trophy case.
“It’s a hard message to send when we’re sad, but yeah, it is this thought of, well, we played a very good team, very tough, and we fought still, and it didn’t go our way, but we still fought,” Ker said. “So are we going to learn the lessons that we need to learn from this match so that we can apply them to the next thing?… Getting momentum and playing great volleyball, and knowing that my team is willing to battle and challenge themselves the way they did tonight, it bodes well for the next opportunity to compete. So I’m looking forward to getting in the gym with them on Monday and competing on Tuesday.”