Since Aug. 28, only Moorpark has been able to walk away from a meeting with the Santa Barbara City College women’s volleyball team as a winner.
The Vaqueros made sure it didn’t happen again on Tuesday, winning for the 18th time in their last 19 games by coming from behind to beat the No. 4 Raiders 20-25, 25-20, 26-28, 25-17, 15-11 at the Sports Pavilion.
SBCC (18-2, 7-1 WSC), ranked No. 6 in the state, snapped the Raiders’ 11-game win streak and pulled itself into a tie for first place in the Western State Conference. On Oct. 20, Moorpark (17-2, 7-1 WSC) ended the Vaqueros’ school-record 12-game win streak in a four-game decision.
“That was a huge match for us. It was a match we’ve been waiting for for a long time,” said head coach Ed Gover. “The first time we played them we didn’t know them that well. Now, we had them diagnosed pretty good.”
Moorpark still took a two-games-to-one lead before SBCC turned it around by dominating the fourth game, emboldened by freshman setter Kelsey Soos’ six-point service run that gave the Vaqueros a 14-6 lead.
SBCC maintained that margin throughout the fourth set and won 25-17. It never trailed in the fifth set en route to the 15-11 clincher.
“When we were down, we weren’t like ‘oh my gosh, we’re going to lose’,” explained middle Jenn Waddill. “No, we were ‘you’re getting this!'”
Maria Mayer, Nicole Bergmann and Emilia Shugrue came through with matching game-highs of 13 kills. Soos kept spreading it out, finding Waddill for 11 kills and Jessica Tune for eight more.
“Every hitter was on and the passing towards the end was really good,” credited Soos.
Jake Kelly picked up 23 digs and Tune put up 21.
“We had a great scouting report on them and I think that we just stopped some of the things they really like doing,” Gover said, adding that his players were also better composed.
“We prepared for going five. When it happened, we didn’t get down,”
SBCC has two regular season matches remaining before the postseason. Friday is a road game at Hancock before Ventura visits the Sports Pavilion for the finale on Tuesday.
