The boys volleyball team secured a win against the San Mateo Bearcats in four sets, 23-25, 25-21, 25-15, and 25-16, on Wednesday evening.
The Bears had a shaky start and struggled with serve receives and defensive miscommunication, giving San Mateo an early 6-2 lead. However, a massive solo block from junior outside hitter Ben Warner* helped shift the momentum, soon tying the score 7-7.
Freshman libero Nick Sandoval put pressure on the Bearcats with a strong service run, delivering back-to-back aces and forcing an overpass that senior setter Peter Chriss hammered down for a kill. Struggling to regain control, San Mateo called a timeout with the Bears up 15-10.
The Bearcats came out of the timeout strong with a 5-point run, consistently tooling M-A’s blocks and utilizing their unforced errors. When they regained their lead at 16-15, M-A called a timeout to regroup. But their struggles continued—more miscommunication led to balls dropping untouched. San Mateo extended their lead to 21-16 after another mishap when Chriss set up a ball with no hitter prepared to swing.
Just as momentum seemed lost, Warner and senior opposite hitter Jonny Kerr fought to keep M-A in the game, tightening the Bearcats’ lead to just 21-19. Despite this, another string of missed serves ultimately sealed the set for the Bearcats, with M-A losing 25-23.
“After the first set we regrouped and focused on cleaning up our errors, making our serves in, and working on our passes for the next set,” Sandoval said.
Determined to bounce back, M-A came out strong in the second set, with early kills from Warner and junior middle blocker Millo Skhiri that gave the Bears a 7-4 lead.
Errors from both teams kept the score close as missed serves and unforced errors brought the score to 13-10.
The Bearcats tried to repeat their success from the previous set, but fell short in fighting off M-A’s offensive pressure. The Bears were able to move the set around, giving multiple hitters the opportunity to score. Simultaneously, San Mateo struggled with a series of unforced errors, including missed serves and swings into the net. The lead quickly grew to 17-12 in favor of M-A.
The Bears soon started to lose focus, though. Balls were dropping on M-A’s side, they were making net errors, and got called out of rotation. The Bearcats capitalized on these mistakes and managed to creep within one point, making it 20-19.
Determined to not drop another set to San Mateo, the Bears quickly cleaned up their offense and finished off the second set 25-21.
M-A went in the third set committed to keeping San Mateo from taking the lead. Sandoval set the tone with an incredible hustle play, diving to keep a ball in play that was barely in reach.
Despite M-A’s energy, San Mateo held their ground, trading points to keep the score at 5-5. However, the pressure of Chriss’ serves disrupted the Bearcats’ rhythm, leading to aces and overpass kills that M-A quickly capitalized on, giving the Bears a 7-5 lead.
From there, M-A took full control and dominated on offense. At 14-11, Warner stepped up at the service line and delivered a four-point run that stretched their lead to 18-11.
As M-A reached set point, the referee called a rotation violation on San Mateo, halting play just before the serve. After continued back-and-forth, the referee issued a yellow card as a warning for unsportsmanlike behavior. With that, the set ended in M-A’s favor, sealing a dominant 25-15 third-set win.
In the fourth set, the Bears were determined to wrap the game up. Despite their determination, the set began with errors from both sides, tying the score at 5-5. Skhiri ended the streak with a kill that struck one of the San Mateo defenders right on the head, giving M-A an 8-5 lead.
M-A took control of their service game, with junior opposite hitter Quinn Robbins delivering an ace during a four-point serving run. San Mateo struggled to keep pace, and errors on their side of the net allowed M-A to run away with the set up 16-9.
A monster roof by Skhiri and Kerr paired with kills by Warner and Kerr solidified M-A’s dominance in the set, bringing the score to 23-14.
At match point, M-A faced a few struggles to put the ball away, missing a serve and getting called for a net violation. However, on the third match point, an error on San Mateo’s side sealed the fourth set 25-16, winning the match 3-1.
“We were too confident when we saw their hitting lines, we thought they would give us the win, but that’s not what happened. In the second, third, and fourth set, we really picked it up, and we came together as a team,” sophomore middle blocker Ryan Cunningham said.
“We need to keep the mindset of playing confident, we can’t start off sloppy like today,” Kerr said.
The Bears will travel to face the Hillsdale Knights on Friday at 5:45 p.m.
*Ben Warner is a journalist for the M-A Chronicle.
