On sophomore night with four Vaqueros playing in their last home match City College volleyball beat Moorpark in straight sets Wednesday at the Santa Barbara Sports Pavilion.
Outside hitter Jaiden Pina (No. 8,) opposite hitter Kiel DeTurk (No. 9,) libero Casey Alper (No. 10) and middle blocker To’o To’o (No. 13) all played in their last home matcd match and made sure they came out with a win.
“It was definitely sad at first,” To’o To’o said. “I kinda wanted to not get on the court. Then I realized we had to take care of this team and I had to be there for my team.”
Although To’o To’o is not planning on playing for City College next season he is excited about the team.
“They have a lot of good freshmen,” said To’o To’o about next year’s team. “I might come back just to watch one of their games.”
The Vaqueros were in complete control in the first set as they never fell behind, although Moorpark made it close at the end. With the score tied at 23-23, Pina finished off the set with a kill followed by an ace serve to give City College a 25-23 set win.
In the second set, Moorpark got the first point but that would be its only lead. City College had control the rest of the set and kills from To’o To’o and the freshman outside hitter Taylor McCluskey (No. 4) gave City College a 25-21 set victory.
“Junior’s really clutch when we need him to get kills,” head coach Matt Jones said about To’o To’o.
The third and final set is where Moorpark really got into a rhythm and made it exciting. Moorpark held a 22-18 lead and it looked like the Vaqueros would not be able to come back to win the match, but that’s when they went on a run. City College took the lead at 24-23, but Moorpark didn’t go down without a fight.
“We knew that we were gonna have to claw our way back into the game,” Pina said. “We took a few timeouts and said let’s finish this in three and give our fans what they want.”
The rest of the set went back and forth with the teams having a combined seven chances to win the set. Three of those chances were from Moorpark but were unsuccessful. A kill by McCluskey on City College’s fourth chance to win the match finished off sophomore night with the last set score of 31-29.
“We made our fair share of mistakes,” said Jones. “At the end we kind of just won some crucial points.”
City College came into Wednesday night’s match tied with Long Beach for the third and final playoff spot in the league. The two teams will face off in the last match of the regular season and the winner will move onto the playoffs that begin Friday, April 17.
“We gotta go down there and win,” said Jones.
That playoff deciding game will be held at 6 p.m. Friday, April 10, at Long Beach.
