The562’s coverage of Long Beach Wilson Athletics is sponsored by Joel Bitonio, Class of 2009.
There will be no shortage of action as the Wilson beach volleyball team looks to repeat as the CIF Southern Section Division 2 champion.
However, the reigning champs like their chances and it showed as the Bruins cruised to a dominating win on Wednesday defeating Fountain Valley 4-1 at the Long Beach City College Sand Courts.
“We’re kind of built for playoff success,” Wilson coach Jeremy Cook said. “We’re looking forward to seeing how we stack up against some of these good teams.”
Wilson jumped out to a comfortable lead after winning the first set on four of the five courts to put them in the driver’s seat and as they’ve done since all year juniors Simrin Adams and Sadie Calderone landed the first punch as they swept Fountain Valley’s Jenn Saliba and Sara Saliba 21-7, 21-10.
“I feel like going into this match, a lot of it was about having fun,” Adams said. “Not being carefree, but not focusing too much on the serious side. We know when we have fun, we take care of business.”
It was a special win for the pair as they set the tone for the Bruins to give Wilson a 1-0 lead. However, the Barons didn’t back down as Crystal Cheng and Allison Uong defeated Peyton Agura and Madison Castillo to even the match at 1 all.
That’s when the Bruins got a big lift as the Bruins swept on courts 4 and 5 as the pairs Dani Dobie and Sage Darling, and Charlie Ginsberg and Alex Beverly picked up wins to give the Bruins the match victory with court 2 still playing.
“Getting those wins gives a lot of confidence to those teams,” Calderone said. “Every court matters, and everybody is just as important. We don’t want others to depend on us.”
While Wilson controlled the match on most of the courts, Iyla Alvarado and Jane Morrison found themselves trailing late in the second set after taking a 1-0 lead after a dominating 21-7 win. However, the duo found their footing and mounted the comeback as they defeated Chloe Beal and Ila Robinson, 21-19 to give the Bruins a 4-1 win.
“Iyla and Jane got an easy one in that first set, then battled in the second,” Cook said. “With them, you never have a doubt. Even when it’s close, you feel like they’re going to get it done.”
Wilson will be on the road for the second round when they travel to either El Segundo or Laguna Beach.
“There’s no cupcakes in Division 2 this year,” Cook said. “We know we’re going to play a good team and we know we’ll be on the road. We’re just looking forward to it.”
