By Marc Anthony Martinez
Women’s volleyball finished the regular season with a 3-2 set win against Long Beach City College on sophomore night on Wednesday.
Long Beach is ranked No. 16 in the state and ELAC is tied in the rankings at No. 25.
The game went to all five sets as the Huskies were down two sets to one.
They were able to win set four and take it to the fifth set where they would beat Long Beach 15-12 and sweep the season series against Long Beach.
“We made a few adjustments, and they weren’t really ready for that,” Head Coach Elliot Walker said on what it took to win against Long Beach.
In set one, the Huskies trailed all game and couldn’t get any momentum going, as they lost 25-21.
The second set started off the same with Long Beach looking like they would win easily being up by seven at one point 16-9.
After a service error by libero/defensive specialist Carmen Infante from Long Beach, the Huskies would go on a four-point streak with outside hitter Roselia Cazares killing two out of the four, making it 16-13 for Long Beach.
During this set, the scoreboard started having problems, causing a delay in play.
A couple of points later, multiple Long Beach players got yellow cards because they were yelling at the officials.
The Huskies tied the game at 23 after middle blocker Leah Avila made the kill.
They won 26-24 after Cazares hit the ball off the Long Beach defender for the kill.
Walker then made a switch in the libero position from Alfaro to LB Jessica Apodaca before game three.
“We needed a little more consistent hitting outside to relieve some of the pressure off of Roselia. Alejandra is a very good relief hitter in that context and it also gave our other players a chance to see what we were looking for,” Walker said.
Long Beach controlled this set from the start and beat the Huskies 25 to 15.
Walker received a yellow card during this game that was charged to the bench because officials thought Walker was yelling at them when he was just talking to his players on the far side of the court.
Alfaro would go back to libero for the remaining sets.
“I’ve been a hitter last season but it’s definitely something to adjust to,” Alfaro said about her going from libero to hitter back to libero.
The Huskies started off slow in the fourth set going down by six.
They would go on a four-to-one scoring streak bringing them down by one, making it 12-11.
MB Kiara Davis was able to tie the game at 14.
Davis seemed to fire up the team after this, as they would catch up and take the lead.
“She just understood that she’s an impact player,” Walker said on Davis’ play that helped the Huskies get their momentum.
The Huskies would beat Long Beach that set 25-19.
The fifth set would start off with both teams going back and forth on the scoring until the Huskies took the lead after a 6-6 tie.
With the Huskies up 14-12, Long Beach OH Jordyn Hollins hits the net on the near side on her attack, giving the Huskies the win.
“They’re trained to take each game one at a time and each play one at a time,” Walker said about his team being down and on the verge of losing to coming back and winning.
The Husky fans were chanting “Let’s go Huskies,” and had thunder sticks in between games.
The announcers table had to tell the crowd that noise during when the ball was in play was not allowed.
“We’ve been there before, but with the crowd and the energy, that’s what really pushed us,” Alejandra Alfaro said about the crowd motivating them to beat Long Beach in five sets.
The volleyball team held sophomore night for their last home game of the season and had a celebration and gifts for the sophomores.
They will now wait and see who they will play in the playoffs.