Volleyball Mustangs ground the Ravens

West Valley Varsity Boys’ Volleyball beat Vista Del Lago, 3-0 last Thursday

■ Corey Evan / Sports Reporter

The Varsity Volleyball boys at Hemet West Valley High School have had a pretty good season so far, compared to Moreno Valley’s purple-coated Vista Del Lago Ravens who showed up with a 4-2 record. But did that mean last Thursday’s match wouldn’t have some good moves in store? Quoth “The Raven,” ‘Nevermore.’
The two competitors proved to be very evenly matched from the get-go, but the Mustangs found the Ravens’ weak spot and attacked it as game number one heated up. They ended up taking it 25-16.
In the second game, the Ravens tried to keep it an even match throughout. But once again, the Mustangs attacked them at their weakest spot and took this one, again 25-16. This left the Ravens experiencing déjà vu, as if this had happened before.
The Mustangs didn’t get off to the best start in game number three, but quickly recovered and again throttled ahead of the Ravens. But Coach Shawn Pulsipher observed his team losing steam as they were ahead 22-14 and from there the Ravens closed the gap to just one. This was even after Pulsipher called a timeout. But the fact that it came down to the wire just made this win interesting. They took this game 25-22 in the end.
Among the Mustangs, Kayden Hernandez led kills, having delivered seven, while Colton Rosendahl brought in four aces. Those two could be West Valley’s ace in the hole…
Coach Shaun Pulsipher was certainly happy with his team today: “I thought we played well. To be honest, they had a couple of pretty good hitters, but we defended well… We blocked well, and had some big hits of our own.”
With this win, the Mustangs improve their record to 9-2 for the season, but Pulsipher knows only too well that there’s still a lot more to do: “We served aggressively, even though we had a lot of errors. A lot of aces, but we need to tighten up that part of our game a little bit going forward.”
The boys had better perfect their aces, as they challenge the Patriots of Heritage High today at 4:45 p.m. If you have time, go see them play. It’s right off Highway 74 in Romoland, you can’t miss it.