The addition of basketball star Luke Zuffelato has provided a huge boost for the Santa Barbara High boys volleyball team.
That was evident Tuesday night in the Dons sweep of crosstown rival San Marcos in a tight battle between Channel League unbeaten teams at the Thunderhut. The scores were 28-26, 25-22, 25-23.
The 6-foot-5 Zuffelato, who led the Channel League-champion and CIF-SS Division 1 semifinalist basketball team with a 25-point scoring average, was the volleyball squad’s kill leader against the Royals. He finished with 12 kills, but more importantly it was his presence at the net that made a huge difference.
“Yes,” affirmed Dons coach Chad Arneson about Zuffelato being a big factor in the win. “They say they have the best libero in the area, we have the best athlete in Santa Barbara.”
This was the fifth match for the UCSB basketball commit.
Zuffelato delivered a cross-court kill to pull the Dons into a 23-23 tie in the first set. He then got a piece of San Marcos star hitter Matteo Burdick’s spike from the left side, but it landed out of bounds for a 24-23 Royals’ lead. Santa Barbara setter Chase Holdren went back to Zuffelato on the next play and he put it away to even the score at 24.
The score was knotted again at 26 when San Marcos committed one of its several serving errors in the match. Benicio Duarte scored the set-winning point for the Dons with a jump serve for an ace.
“We don’t win that Game One without his jump serve,” said Arneson of Duarte. “I thought that carried over into the second game.”
San Marcos coach David Goss acknowledged the impact Zuffelato makes for the Dons.
“They’re a big block. Zuffelato is a big addition to their team,” he said. “And they have good solid size in the middle.”
Zuffelato’s height and good hops helped contain the talented Burdick. The talent sophomore still finished with a match-high 16 kills, but the Dons got their hands on a lot of his attacks and forced some errant attacks.
“We wanted to play Luke a little at opposite (right side) in this game and kind of move the block over (toward Burdick) and allow the other players to beat us one on one rather than Matteo two on one,” Arneson explained. “We were able to contain. He got some good swings, but our boys executed.”
After Burdick’s 16 kills, the next highest player for San Marcos had six kills.
Santa Barbara’s attack was more balanced. Outside hitters Hayes Costner and Duarte collected nine and eight kills, respectively, and middles Henry Becker and Kristian Dybdahl each had four kills.
Arneson praised senior setter Chase Holdren for spreading the ball around.
“Chase did a good job. It took him a while to get his groove going but we were able to keep (San Marcos) on their heels.”
Holdren got on a roll in the second set as the Dons went on a 5-1 run and opened up an 18-11 lead.
Santa Barbara also played well at the defensive end. Libero Jack Goligoski and Duarte kept several plays alive with digs and scrambles on the floor.
“I thought it was a great team effort,” said Arneson, “Jack Goligoski, I give him a lot of props. He is also one of the best liberos here in this town. He was picking up everything. He’s been our floor general this year; it’s blessing to have someone I can trust out on the court, telling the guys what to do.”
Goss said his Royals struggled with consistency.
“What I noticed with the boys tonight was they had four really good plays and then three bad plays ,where we gave away a lot of points. And we can’t afford to give away good points to a solid team like Santa Barbara.”
He noted the team might have been experiencing a tournament hangover after winning the Dos Pueblos Invitational on Saturday, “but I’m not taking anything away from Santa Barbara High. They played a really solid game. They passed well —our serving wasn’t really effective — their libero played really well, they were solid in their passing game. We didn’t have a lot of success with our serve and we did not pass particularly well, either.”
Goss praised the play of his young middles Owen Heath and Jamie Hetrick.
“They’re really developing fast as young volleyball players and it’s great to see them getting some production for us,” he said.
San Marcos (10-7, 3-1) is back on the court Wednesday for a non-league match at Oak Park and returns home against Ventura for a league match on Thursday.
Santa Barbara (8-2, 4-0) plays host to league foe Pacifica on Thursday.