There are CIF-SS championship banners for a lot of sports hanging on the walls of Bishop Diego’s Brick House Gym.
There isn’t a banner for boys volleyball, but this year’s Cardinals squad is on the verge of hanging the first one. And, they’ll get the chance to do it on their home court.
Bishop will host Long Beach-St. Anthony for the Division 5 championship on Friday at the Brick House at 6 p.m.
It’s been a magical season for Coach Dillan Bennett’s Cardinals (27-8). Early in the season, they beat Channel League member Dos Pueblos, which was the top seed in the Division 5 playoffs; they went undefeated in the Tri-Valley League, including two sweeps against Foothill Tech, which is in the Division 7 final; they took a set off undefeated Channel League champion and Division 1 playoff team San Marcos; in the playoffs, they pulled off a reverse sweep to win at Brea Olinda in the quarterfinals and rebounded from a first-set loss to beat El Dorado in four sets in the semifinals; their 27 wins is the most in program history.
Bennett has experience coaching in CIF championships. He’s guided the Bishop girls program to two finals, winning a title in 2021 and finishing as runner-up to Long Beach Poly in a five-set match in 2024.
His Bishop boys team is primarily a collection of standout multi-sport athletes. John Michael Flint, Luca Moreno-Murphy, Tyler Roberts, Tua Rojas, Kingston Bustos, Ian Bartley played football, and Rojas, Flint and Bustos transitioned to basketball in the winter to join Krautmann, one of the top scorers on the team.
When spring rolled around, Bennett got them to play volleyball. Flint, Nico DeRosa, Moreno-Murphy and Krautmann are four-year players; Luke Walters and Roberts are in their third year on the squad and Rojas, Bustos, Mikey Gomez, George Velazquez, Bartley are playing for the first time.
They bought in to Bennett’s plan to build a solid boys volleyball program similar to the other high schools in town.
“As freshmen and sophomores, this collection of players started taking the sport seriously because they all played other sports together,” Bennett explained. “John Michael was the driving force and really helped build on the seniors’ momentum in his freshman year; they had committed themselves to taking volleyball seriously.
“Once John Michael started pulling kids from football and basketball like Damien Krautmann and Tyler Roberts, others began to follow. Even this year, half of our roster is playing the sport for the first time, and it’s only because they have had such fun playing football or basketball together in the past. All I’ve tried to do is keep volleyball fun for them as they learned the game. I guess it’s been a winning formula.”
Bishop will be taking on a veteran St. Anthony squad that’s guided by a successful coach. First-year coach Jeremy Malazarte inherited a roster of several returnees off a Camino Real League championship team. Junior Griffin Bass, a dynamic 6-foot-6 middle attacker, has been a force for the Saints. He had 28 kills in a quarterfinal win over Western Christian and 16 against Bellflower in the semifinals.
Before arriving at St. Anthony, Malazarte led Carson High to back-to-back L.A. City Section championships.
St. Anthony (18-7) is coming off back-to-back five-set wins in the playoffs. The Saints needed a reverse sweep to beat Bellflower in the semifinals.
