REDONDO BEACH — The Redondo boys volleyball team came up short in its quest for its first CIF Southern Section championship last week.
But it was able to celebrate winning its first CIF Southern California Regional title Saturday.
It wasn’t easy, but the Sea Hawks defeated St. Margaret’s in five sets, 25-19, 17-25, 22-25, 25-21, 15-12, in the Division II regional final at Redondo High.
“This team is a grinder team,” Redondo coach Kevin Norman said. “We just try to play defense and usually pass the ball well. We had a little lapse at moments of this match. What I like about this team the most is they do a very good job of not getting too emotional.”
That mentality was tested during Saturday’s match, but Redondo was able to pull together and walk away with the title.
“We got upset a little bit in this game because there were a lot of calls going against us,” Norman said, “but we locked it down, forgot about that and just played our game.
“They were marching on us a little bit at the end and sure enough we did our thing and we got a call our way. Which is kind of what I try to tell them. You can’t control those things, so you might as well just continue to do what you’re doing and find ways to get the ball back and hopefully the other team will make some mistakes too.”
The Sea Hawks (32-8) were swept by Santa Margarita in the CIF-SS Division 2 final on May 11, but qualified for the regional playoffs. That gave the Sea Hawks a chance to punctuate the season with a championship.
“We didn’t play well (in the CIF-SS finals). The guys were bummed,” Norman said, “but having a chance to still compete, I think gave them hope. And knowing it (the regionals) was right away, we didn’t have to wait awhile.”
“We definitely had a hangover. We came out against Chatsworth (Tuesday) and it was a barn-burner first set. It was not easy.”
The main challenge for Redondo in Saturday’s match was finding a way to slow St. Margaret’s senior outsider hitter Reed Wainwright, who finished with 30 kills.
“In the fourth set, I put a bigger lineup on their bigger guy (Wainwright), just to kind of keep somebody over there big to try to get some touches,” Norman said. “I think we did. They were using him a lot, then they started to go away from him and then it was a little bit of an even match-up.”
After losing the third set and falling behind 2-1 in the match, the Sea Hawks regrouped quickly.
St. Margaret’s was forced to call its first timeout at 8-5 and after a Bobby Bennett block gave Redondo a 13-7 lead, St. Margaret’s called its second timeout.
Later, Redondo cruised to set point at 24-17, but it wasn’t easy closing the set as St. Margaret’s rallied to get within three points at 24-21, before Bennett closed out the set with a kill that forced a fifth set.
“Being down 2-1, we came out and said we have nothing to lose,” Bennett said. “We made it this far, why not?”
The momentum from the fourth set carried over to the fifth as the Sea Hawks took a 10-3. A kill by Luke Goldmann gave them match point and after what seemed to be several net violations called against them, the Sea Hawks’ winning point came on a net violation by St. Margaret’s.
Bennett and Goldmann had 17 kills apiece and Essert finished with 16 as the Sea Hawks closed the season with a bit of history.
“I’ve been in the CIF finals three times prior to that (last week’s final) and came up short with Bishop Montgomery,” Norman said. “It was nice for me to get this one because I was also in the state finals with Bishop and lost that …(this) feels good for me as well.”
Related Articles
Corona del Mar to play Huntington Beach in first round of boys volleyball regional playoffs
Happy times for Santa Margarita boys volleyball as it wins Division 2 title with sweep of Redondo
St. Margaret’s sweeps San Clemente to win another CIF-SS boys volleyball championship
Sage Hill boys volleyball rallies to beat San Marino to win first CIF-SS title
Samueli Academy boys volleyball team sweeps Riverside Poly, wins first section title in school history
Leave a Reply