Poly sweeps Notre Dame in opener
LONG BEACH ❯❯ Poly girls volleyball firstyear coach Gerald Aquiningoc wants his team to understand that it's fine being boring at times.
After Poly finished off a 25-15, 25-18, 25-20 sweep Thursday against Sherman Oaks Notre Dame in the opening round of the CIF Southern Section Division 3 playoffs, the example he used with his team was the NBA's San Antonio Spurs.
“They just dominate, but it's boring and they stick to their system,” Aquiningoc said. “That's what we gotta do.”
Poly (25-9) started slowly, picked it up through the second set and the start of the third, then hit a lull twice en route to the victory.
The Jackrabbits, co-champions of the Moore League, will host Crean Lutheran (17-5) in today's second round. First serve is scheduled for 6 p.m.
“I think it was more mental, just a little bit of mental fatigue,” Jackrabbits middle blocker Kristen Dear said after notching a match-high 12 kills. “It's like, OK, we're so close to the finish line and we can see it. But we still need to focus on what we're doing and do our job all the way to the end.”
Poly jumped out to an 8-2 lead in the third set before Notre Dame (12-15) immediately responded with a 9-3 spurt to tie the frame.
The set was tied three more times, the last occasion at 16-16, before the Jackrabbits found separation. Kalia Teofilo had three of Poly's 11 service aces during the key 8-0 stretch to get to match point.
The Knights battled back once more to pull within 24-20 before a serve sailed long to end the match.
“When they try to get fancy and cute and make the spectacular play, bad things are happening,” Aquinin-goc said of the finish. “We get a lot of errors, they're playing outside of themselves, they're trying to do too many things, and we just need to make the right play, not the extravagant play.
“We were really, really, really high on energy and it was sometimes not to our benefit just because the heartbeat is too fast and they're just trying to do too many things . ... That's what happened at the end there. They were feeding off the crowd — “L-B-C” — and swinging to the wall.”
Outside hitter Mahlia Priestley paced the Knights with eight kills and a block.
Notre Dame coach Jon Dazé, in his first year with the program, said the effort was consistent with what he's seen from a team that battled injuries throughout the season while trying to establish a culture for the future foundation.
“That's been our character all year,” Dazé said of a program that finished third in the Angelus League. “We're not the type of team that's going to quit.
“We just couldn't quite find our stride. On top of a new head coach and new regime, we had to make adjustments and so by the time playoffs came, at least we had that to fall back on — the fight.”
To open the match, Poly battled through a 9-9 tie in a start marred by a violation or attack error on all but two of Notre Dame's points.
That's when Dear and fellow middle blocker Layla Moore got the Jackrabbits into a flow. Moore finished with seven kills and three blocks, with all but four kills coming in the opening frame.
“Our first touch, serving was really strong to the areas we were supposed to serve to,” Dear said. “A lot of our first passes were good ... which made it easier on everyone else.”
Poly opposite hitter Saniya Kimbrough then added balance, collecting eight of her nine kills over the final two sets to help keep Notre Dame from loading up at the middle of the net.
“She's got a really live arm and she's just able to power through blocks,” Aquiningoc said. “She played a really big role to keeping their block split and keeping us in 1-on-1 situations.
“We were able to do what we wanted. I knew this game was going to kind of be an ugly one just because there's unsaid pressure — this program hasn't won a first-round playoff game in a very long time . ... But we talk about learning how to win in any kind of way and we got a good win.”