Monarchs top Sailors

Patrick Laverty

After Newport Harbor High’s girls volleyball team lost in four games

to Mater Dei in a nonleague match in late September, Sailors Coach

Dan Glenn told his players that they would be returning to the

Monarchs’ gym, predicating a state playoff game between the two

powers.

Glenn’s assertion was dead on, but the result in Saturday’s CIF

State regional semifinal wasn’t much different from the original

meeting.

The Sailors once again lost in four games, their season ended by a

25-22, 21-25, 25-17, 25-14 Monarchs victory.

Despite entering the third game tied at 1-1, the turning point for

Newport Harbor (26-7) may have been the first game, in which it

stormed to a 13-4 lead.

But on the next point a Newport Harbor dig hit the short ceiling

in the Monarchs’ gym, giving Mater Dei the point. The Monarchs (34-3)

scored seven of the next 10 points, closing the gap to 16-12.

After a kill by Harbor’s Lauren Miller, Mater Dei reeled off nine

of the next 10 points for a 21-18 lead and eventually captured the

first game, 25-22.

“We let that first game slip away,” Glenn said. “I’m not saying we

would have won the match because Mater Dei wasn’t going to fold, but

it would have been nice to keep the pressure on them.”

Surprisingly, the momentum didn’t stay in the Monarchs’ favor.

Newport Harbor again opened a big lead in the second game, this time

jumping out to a 10-2 advantage after a kill by junior Kiley Hall,

one of just two non-seniors to receive significant playing time for

Harbor.

But once again, Mater Dei crawled back into the game, eventually

taking an 18-17 advantage.

This time, however, Newport Harbor wasn’t going to let it slip

away. A pair of kills by Alyson Jennings, who led the Sailors with 12

kills on the night, returned the lead to the Sailors and they never

relinquished it on their way to a second-game victory.

The fight for that victory seemed to take a lot out of Newport

Harbor however, and the fact that they could, and possibly should,

have had a two-game lead loomed larger now.

“They took it to us in our gym,” Mater Dei Coach Craig Pazani

said. “If they win that first game, who knows what could have

happened.”

What happened is the Monarchs received strong play from a pair of

sophomores, Chelsea Pavlik and Meghan Meehan, who came off the bench

to spark Mater Dei in the final two games.

Meehan, in particular, was a menace at the net. She ended the

third game with a pair of blocks to give Mater Dei a 2-1 lead, then

opened the fourth game by scoring two quick points as the Monarchs

took a big, early lead this time, eventually increasing the margin in

the fourth game to 10-1.

“[Meehan] was unbelievable,” Pazani said. “She blocked five or six

balls just in those last two games.”

The Sailors attempted to chip away at the Monarchs’ advantage, but

never got closer than six points. Newport Harbor stung together

consecutive points just three times in the final game and just once

did they score more than two points in a row.

“We played a real good opponent,” Glenn said. “We just got too far

down early on in the fourth game.”

Hall finished with 10 kills for the Sailors and Miller added

eight. Alexis Kearns came up with two aces, while Kellie King came up

with some marvelous digs, particularly in the first two games.