As El Camino Beach Volleyball duo Diana Enriquez and Emily Uhrinak stared down their rivals from across the net, they could not help but glance at the red numbers on the scoreboard screaming their two point deficit.

The No. 4 pair were four points away from clinching a spot to the CCCAA Beach Volleyball Team State Championships after a 21 match long hot streak spanning the entirety of their conference season.

For coach Liz Hazell and the Warriors team, this deciding match means a chance at the state title.

“Long Beach is a big rival for us because they’re in our conference,” Hazell said, “they’re always tough and scrappy and bring a lot of energy.”

After the Warriors sailed through the No. 6 seeded MiraCosta Spartans 4-1, next came the No. 11 seeded Long Beach Vikings. Although they struck first blood against Warrior duo Ginia Goods and Kaila Siu, they were ultimately beat out by tough plays from the Warriors, earning El Camino a 3-2 match victory in tournament style play on Tuesday, May 3.

“It’s always good to be confident in the team,” Hazell said. “You want to be confident but not cocky, believe in our skills and take the ball on our side, and then make adjustments, so it was exciting to see us come out on top on that and now get to move on to the state championship.”

Enriquez expressed the nerves that took over going into playoff matches against MiraCosta and Long Beach but found comfort and rhythm within her partner’s dominance on the sand.

“Emily’s blocking and offense really carried [the match],” Enriquez said, “it puts a lot of ease on the defensive side of things.”

Enriquez said that the Warriors tend to go neck and neck with the Vikings, so she kept the mentality of playing to have fun and holding errors to a minimum, which ultimately pushed her duo over the top to win the go-ahead match.

While some of the Warriors players experienced struggle in the match, the No. 1 pair Fayth Rascon and Lauren McCarthy cruised through their matchup with little trouble.

Recently winning the 2022 South Coast Conference Pairs Championship title at Long Beach City College, Rascon and McCarthy played against the Vikings Jennifer Lias and Celestial Ropati routing them in a two set match win of 21-16 and 21-15.

Screaming out calls and signs during the match, McCarthy explained how her communication with her partner is what sets them apart from other teams when playing as pairs.

“We never shut up, it lets you know where the other person is, kind of like echolocation,” McCarthy said. “You know what you want, you know where you want your set, you know where to put the ball because you’re giving a good call.”

Rascon said that chemistry and communication are vital skills between partners, explaining how it helps slow down the game which makes the play flow a little bit easier when up against big opponents.

“We have great communication as a partnership,” Rascon said. “We set each other really well, we’re all over defense balls and we’re both making moves.”

After finding out that the Warriors would move onto the state championship, Rascon said that she believes that this is a huge opportunity for a volleyball player’s career and something that she would remember for a long time.

While the Warriors were celebrating their ticket to the state championship, Vikings’ No. 1 pair Ropati reflected on her team’s close match loss and end of their season.

“We knew we were gonna have to work for it,” Ropati said. “We could have done better reading [calls] and made better decisions, on defense but we learned a lot.”

For Long Beach City College, their beach volleyball season comes to an end with an overall standing of 11-6.

El Camino College, whose overall standing is 22-3, advances to the CCCAA Beach Volleyball Team State Championships for the second time in the young program’s history at Irvine Valley College on Thursday, May 12.