The score tied 20-20, a win for the second volleyball set within reach for both teams as Santa Barbara Vaqueros No. 9 Ayden Welch stepped to the service line.
The crack of the volleyball echoed off his serve. Warriors No. 9 Octavious Corona answered the attack, only to be blocked at the net by Vaqueros No. 18 Nick Schultz and No. 22 Evan Thompson.
In the serves that followed, the El Camino College Warriors would closely lose the second set 25-23.
The Vaqueros went on to sweep the Warriors in three sets at the men’s volleyball game Wednesday, March 25, delivering payback on their home court.
One month before, on Friday, Feb. 27, the Warriors beat the Vaqueros 3-2 in their hometown at UCSB, making Wednesday’s win all the more sweeter.
“I think we really wanted to come back and win, because we lost against them in 5 at home, so we really wanted to beat them at their home,” Bridget Kulesh, coach for Santa Barbara City College, said.
In the first two sets, the Warriors relatively followed closely behind the Vaqueros, only losing eight points in the first set (25-17) and two points in the second set (25-23).
The Warriors finished the third set with a 13 point difference (25-13).
“I feel like in game two, we had a lot of fire and then we kind of got stuck in that one rotation and gave up a few points,” Warriors coach Liz Hazell said.
As the Vaqueros were missing a few key players due to an illness that swept the team, No. 8 Parker Dison and Thompson played positions they usually aren’t in: right-side hitter and opposite.
“It’s been a bit of an adjustment, [playing opposite]” Thompson said.
Warriors No. 7 and team captain Jordan Jotie finished up with the most amount of kills at 11, while Vaqueros team caption, No. 11 Mykolas Petritias, closely followed with 10.
“I think we played really good but…I definetely think we can work on our mental [state] during games,” Jotie said
At Santa Barbara, Mykolas Petritias was recently named state player of the week.
“Overall it was just super solid passing was pretty good, serving was really good… consistency won us the game,” Petritias said.
The Warrior’s next game is Friday, March 27 6 p.m. in the ECC West Gymnasium against Moorpark College.
“I think overall we just made, way too many hitting errors like we couldn’t find the court…hopefully for Moorpark on Friday we clean that up a little bit with having a balanced attack,” Hazell said.
