Bishop Diego boys volleyball remained undefeated on the young season with a three-set sweep of crosstown rival Laguna Blanca on Thursday inside the Brick House.
The Cardinals (5-0, 2-0 Tri-Valley League) and Owls (2-3, 1-1 TVL) have engaged in plenty of thrilling rivalry matchups since 2017, but Bishop Diego rolled to Thursday’s win, 25-12, 25-16, 25-18.
“It’s our own little crosstown rivalry, which is fun,” Bishop Diego head coach Dillan Bennett said. “We don’t have the Santa Barbara/San Marcos/DP deal, but as two small private schools that have had a lot of success in volleyball, it’s really cool to have that with Laguna Blanca.
“I was fortunate enough to work over there for a little while and it just keeps going as Laguna Blanca. They don’t have a whole lot of down years for boys volleyball.”
“For the last bunch of years, we’ve had competitive matches,” Laguna Blanca head coach Jason Donnelly said. “[Bishop] is a really polished team, and we’re pretty inexperienced. I thought overall, we played hard tonight and we kept it close at times.
“We haven’t seen that level of arm swing. We haven’t seen that level of experience yet, so it was good for us to be out there. Now we’re a little bit more battle tested. We’ve seen a good team and we’ll play them again after our spring break and we’ll see what happens then.”
Laguna Blanca started the scoring in the opening set when Soren Alldredge hammered down a kill on the outside, but the Cardinals quickly gained control of the set with back-to-back kills from John Michael Flint.
Flint’s early flash proved to be a sign of things to come, as the multi-sport standout shined on the outside throughout the first set. He also excelled at the service line, where he inherited an 8-3 lead and quickly grew it to 13-3 with a five-point run that featured two aces.
Bishop Diego continued to pull away throughout the set for the eventual commanding 25-12 win, capped off by an ace from Flint.
Flint led the charge all night, hammering home 11 kills and recording five aces from the service line.
“He’s definitely our leader emotionally, physically and volleyball-wise,” Bennett said of Flint. “Last year, he was our go-to player, and the year before that, he was a go-to player. Now this year, the other teams know he’s the go-to player.
“So far, it hasn’t seemed to matter. He still answers the bell. It’s been really fun to watch him grow it all, and I’m obviously really happy I don’t have to coach against him.”
Despite the first-set loss, Soren Alldredge of the Owls delivered several big swings in the early stages to help keep his team competitive.
The second set was much more competitive than the first, as the two sides exchanged blows early and the Owls held onto a 4-2 lead after an ace by Alldredge.
A trio of Laguna Blanca miscues allowed the Cardinals to take their first lead of the set at 5-4, but a kill out of the back row by Alldredge quickly tied it back up at 5-5. Bishop Diego then got a kill from Damien Krautmann that sparked a bit of a run to build the lead out to 11-6.
The back-and-forth continued as the Owls crept back into the set and cut the deficit to 12-11 after Alldredge tallied a kill and a solo block on back-to-back points and the Cardinals were called for a net violation.
Alldredge was a force for Laguna Blanca and ended the night with a match-high 15 kills.
“Soren is doing such a nice job playing a different position when everybody knows we’re setting them every ball,” Donnelly said. “When teams prepare for him, and he still can play at that level, it’s great. He’s still learning, because he’s been a middle his whole life and now he’s playing all over the place
“As our other hitters get caught up to speed, we won’t have to set him every single ball. That’s not the game plan, but it kept us in it tonight.”
However, regained its groove following a kill by Flint, rattling off four unanswered points to prompt a Laguna Blanca timeout. The Cardinals held that comfortable lead for the rest of the set and rolled to a 25-16 win.
The third set played out very similarly to the second, as the crosstown rivals swung back and forth in the early stages with ties at 5-5 and 8-8. Bishop Diego regained its momentum and back-to-back big swings by Flint grew its lead to 15-10 and prompted a Laguna Blanca timeout.
Despite the Owls scoring two straight points out of the break, the Cardinals maintained a comfortable lead for the rest of the set on their way to a 25-18 win and the sweep.
Bishop Diego’s seasoned team will look to keep it rolling against Providence on Friday, while the Owls will host Dunn next week.
“We’ve got 10 seniors, and we’ve got five guys returning from last year’s team that was pretty successful too,” Bennett said. “The other guys that have come in are all good athletes. They’ve played other sports; they just haven’t spent a whole lot of time playing volleyball. So it’s really those guys who have kind of accelerated things for us and fit in really well in the spots where we had holes.
“We’ve got good outside hitting, we have good passing, we have a good setter. Now it’s just in certain rotations, we may not need a position player, but we just need someone to play a role.”