Vaqueros outlast Irvine Valley 3-2 for 4th straight win

Shaft Wesley made a spectacular college debut with 13 kills on Wednesday night and 6-9 middle blocker Jeremy Berch had 12 kills and six blocks as SBCC outlasted Irvine Valley 3-2 in a men's volleyball match at the Sports Pavilion.

The scores were 25-22, 16-25, 25-20, 23-25, 15-11 in a match that lasted nearly two hours.

"Shaft did a nice job in his first match and took some good aggressive swings," said coach Matt Jones. "He kind of got away from it in Set 4 but bounced back in Set 5 and had some smart swings when we needed them late."

Sean Reynaert added 10 kills, five digs and four blocks for the Vaqueros, who won their fourth straight to improve to 4-1. Berch had six blocks and the Vaquero middles dominated with To'o To'o hitting .700 with eight kills and Berch posting a .529 percentage.

Casey Alper led in digs with 13 and Wesley added eight. Cole Murray topped the Lasers (1-2) with 22 kills.

"I was watching our last match and I wanted to bring the intensity," said Wesley, a 6-2 freshman outside hitter from Sacramento. "Not just when we make great plays but when we make bad ones as well. Everybody raised the intensity in the fifth set. Coach told us to float serve instead of jump serve and that kept us in system."

The Vaqueros used a 6-2 run in the fifth set to take an 8-6 lead on a kill by Wesley. Irvine got within two at 11-9 on a putaway by Arek Halaj but SBCC stretched the lead to 13-10 on a solo block and kill by Reynaert, a 6-5 opposite from Belgium.

The lead grew to 14-10 on a Laser hitting error, then Cole scored a point, prompting a timeout by the Vaqueros. Taylor McCluskey capped the victory with a kill through the block.

SBCC struggled in the serve game with two aces and 15 service errors.

"That's a good team with a lot of good hitters," said Jones. "We went 5 with them last year and 5 with them tonight. It was a real back-and-forth match. I think they'll be a playoff team this year, so it was a good test for us."

There were 10 ties and eight lead changes in the opener before the Vaqueros closed on a 6-2 run to win 25-22. The set ended when IVC hit a spike long.

Irvine broke open a tight second set with an 8-0 run that produced a 21-14 advantage. The Vaqueros dominated the third set with leads of 10-5, 16-10 and 21-14. Wesley capped the third-set win with a powerful kill.

The Vaqueros hit the road for their final two non-conference matches – Friday at defending state champion Orange Coast and the following Friday, Feb. 20, at Golden West.