Huntington Beach’s Justin Bulsombut taps the ball over the net to score a point against Corona del Mar in a Surf League boys volleyball game in Newport Beach on Wednesday, April 17, 2024. (Photo by Paul Rodriguez, Contributing Photographer)
NEWPORT BEACH – If Wednesday’s Huntington Beach versus Corona del Mar match was a preview, and it probably was, the CIF Southern Section Division 1 boys volleyball playoffs will be outstanding.
Huntington Beach beat Corona del Mar in five very athletic and very entertaining sets, 20-25, 25-15, 19-25, 26-24, 15-10, in the Surf League finale for both teams.
Newport Harbor beat Edison in Wednesday’s other Surf League match. Corona del Mar and Newport Harbor are league co-champions with 4-2 records. Huntington Beach is third at 3-3, Edison fourth at 1-5.
Corona del Mar takes a 21-6 overall record into the playoffs. Huntington Beach is 26-5.
Huntington Beach junior middle blocker Nick Ganier had a team-high 16 kills. Senior outside hitter Bennet Tchaikovsky had 14 kills as did senior opposite hitter Aidan Dubno. Freshman middle blocker Logan Hutnick contributed 12 kills. Senior setter Jake Pazanti had 53 assists.
The Oilers trailed Corona del Mar 17-16 in the fourth set. Huntington Beach from there outscored the Sea Kings 10-7 to win the set and carried that momentum into the fifth set.
Tchaikovsky recently returned to action. He had missed several matches after tearing a meniscus during last month’s Best of the West tournament in San Diego.
“It’s been a struggle the past month trying to find a lineup with Bennet not in the game,” said Pazanti, whose father Craig Pazanti is the team’s coach. “He does so much for us, offensively and defensively. He makes us a better team, makes us more together.”
Wednesday’s match was Huntington Beach’s fourth five-set match in league play. They are 2-2 in those matches, including a win over Newport Harbor and losses to Corona del Mar and Edison.
“It’s good to get a win,” Craig Pazanti said. “This puts a lot of thoughts back on maybe one or two (matches) we let get away earlier … opportunities to win and maybe win the league.”
Corona del Mar senior Sterling Foley, a leading candidate for Orange County player of the year, led the Sea Kings with 22 kills. He also had four aces.
In addition to his rocket-blast spikes, Foley also makes the tough digs and is an adroit passer.
Sea Kings coach Katey Thompson, who of course would prefer that her team won the Surf League championship outright instead of sharing it with Newport Harbor, after the match looked ahead to the playoffs.
“The good thing is we’ve played almost everybody in that top eight (in Division 1),” she said. “It’s going to be a grind and it’s going to be a difficult road ahead of us.”
All four Surf League teams seem destined to be in the eight-team Division 1 bracket when the boys volleyball playoff pairings are released Saturday morning. The eight teams will be divided into two pools, with three rounds of pool play starting Wednesday, April 24. The winners of Pool A and Pool B will meet in the Division 1 final May 11 at Cerritos College.
CIF-SS rankings usually determine seedings and bracket composition. That could be true for identifying the eight teams that will be in Division 1.
The top eight teams in the Division 1 rankings this week are, in order: 1. Loyola; 2. Corona del Mar; 3. Mira Costa; 4. Edison; 5. Huntington Beach; 6. Newport Harbor; 7. Mater Dei; 8. Redondo. Tesoro is No. 9 and San Marcos of Santa Barbara is No. 10.
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