It was exciting, entertaining, electric, excruciating, enthralling and epic. Friday night’s CIF volleyball first-round encounter between Dos Pueblos and Palos Verdes at Sovine Gym had everything you wanted in a postseason tournament match.
The teams battled through five energy-draining games, with Palos Verdes pulling out a wild 20-25, 26-28, 25-22, 28-26, 17-15 thriller in front of a delirious crowd. The Sea Kings scored the last three points of the final game to break the Chargers’ hearts and advance to the second round in the Division 1 playoffs.
“I told the guys it was an epic match between two evenly matched teams that just battled, period,” Dos Pueblos coach Chris Hughes said. “I told the guys, ‘You have nothing to hang your head about at all.’ It was a great match that could have gone either way.
“I said during a couple of timeouts that we needed to make a couple of plays and we made some and we made them work. They just made one more than we did.”
Senior setter Tim Baxter, who threw his body around the court to keep plays alive, said he couldn’t have asked for more from his teammates.
“Everyone just played their hearts out,” he said. “We left it all on the court. We gave up our bodies. We were all diving around on the court, trying to get every ball we could. You got to give (Palos Verdes) credit, they’re a great team. It just came down to a couple of points there.”
A huge point came late in the fourth game. The Chargers (16-7) had a swing for the match at 24-23 but middle attacker Cody Zoesch couldn’t get a snap on Baxter’s set and sent his spike long.
“It was just me getting a step under the set,” said the 6-8 Zoesch, who was dominating in the middle with 23 kills on 32 attempts. “That’s how it goes in matches sometimes.”
Palos Verdes middle Kyle Rehkemper put away the next ball to give the Sea Kings a 25-24 advantage. Zoesch came back and delivered a kill to knot the score.
The teams traded points before the Sea Kings finished off the game. Eric Feldman delivered a kill on the outside for a 27-26 lead and Palos Verdes won the tension-filled game when DP’s Robbie Mestas and Baxter failed to connect on a quick set in the middle.
It was a tough loss to swallow because the Chargers fought back from a 20-17 deficit, thanks to a couple of stellar plays from substitute back-row player Daniel Huthsing. Huthsing made a diving save that resulted in a Will McCracken kill that tied the score at 21. On the very next play, he took a blast square in the face and the Chargers were able play it over the net. Palos Verdes ended up misplaying the ball and DP took the lead 22-21.
“Oh my God, that was amazing,” said Baxter of Huthsing’s courageous play.
“He’s not afraid of anything,” said Hughes. “He’s on the all-grovel, all-hustle team.”
The 15-point fifth game was like the others, the teams battling back and forth with the lead. DP was on the brink of losing at 14-13, but McCracken made a big dig and Palos Verdes hit its next attempt out of bounds.
The Sea Kings had trouble handling Huthing’s serve and that set up Zoesch for a kill to put DP at match point at 15-14.
But Palos Verdes responded with two big blocks by Rehkemper, the last one against Zoesch, to pull out the road victory.
“They started tripling up on blocking me,” said Zoesch of the difference between the first two games and the latter three.
“He got tired and lost a little bit of steam, but he played great,” said Hughes of Zoesch.
Palos Verdes was defenseless against Zoesch’s straight-down bombs early in the match.
“I put our best blocker on their best hitter. That’s all we could do in that situation,” said Palos Verdes coach Patrick Lynch. “We tried to get the right matchup and we stuck with it. Kyle Rehkemper is our best blocker — he’s one of the best blockers in the Bay League.”
Rehkemper finished with a team-high seven blocks to go with 15 kills.
“We all sort of sucked in,” Rehkemper said of containing Zoesch. “It was a team effort. We just waited on him and clamped him.”
Feldman’s 19 kills led a balanced attack for the No. 2 team from the Bay League (24-6). Kyle Stevenson had 17 kills and four blocks. Libero Grant Delgado played huge with 20 digs.
“They’re good,” said Hughes of Palos Verdes. “Their libero is excellent, their setter is tall and long and got the ball to the right people at the right time. They made one more play than we did,”
McCracken cracked 14 kills, Jordon Dyer added 10 and Brian Schoneberger nine to pace the DP attack. Zoesch and Schoneberger each had three blocks, libero Cole Arutian picked up 10 digs and Baxter dished out 41 assists.
Hughes said he was proud of his team’s all-out effort.
“I’m really proud of these guys. They stepped up, they played as a team and supported each other. I’d go to battle against any team with these guys. They can play.”
