Gilroy
– At the boys’ volleyball CCS playoff seeding meeting over the
weekend, Gilroy missed out on an at–large bid to the 16–team
playoffs. However, several Mustang players did earn postseason
honors at Monday’s TCAL Supplemental league meeting.
Gilroy – At the boys’ volleyball CCS playoff seeding meeting over the weekend, Gilroy missed out on an at–large bid to the 16–team playoffs. However, several Mustang players did earn postseason honors at Monday’s TCAL Supplemental league meeting.
Senior setter Patrick Largo and junior outside hitter Vinny DeLorenzo were named to the all–league first team. Junior outside hitter Ryan Chisolm and junior middle hitter Dominic Jackson earned second-team honors, while Steven Good, Travis Graham and Adam Moon were named to the honorable mention list. Senior Jared Straub earned the league’s Sportsmanship Award.
“It was kind of nice that the other coaches recognized that we had a pretty good team,” said head coach Craig Martin, whose squad made vast improvements during the course of the season and finished 21–12. “We got a lot of picks.”
In a battle of the setters, Largo narrowly lost out on league MVP honors to Monterey setter Israel Ricardez.
“It was head–to–head,” said Martin of the voting. “Their stats were pretty evenly matched.”
Ricardez’ 7.81 assists per game led the league, with Largo’s 7.48 second. On the season, Largo had 651 assists.
After his final game, a win against Salinas last Friday, Largo said next year he plans on playing volleyball at San Jose State. Eventually he wants to transfer to and hopefully play for Division I Long Beach State.
“He’s the heart and soul of the team,” Martin said. “In the college game, it’s a club team at San Jose State. He’s got a real good chance to step on at that club level. It’s not NCAA, but it’s still a lot of fun. Patrick can definitely play.”
DeLorenzo, the other first-team pick, was Gilroy’s main attacking threat this season. He averaged a second–in–league 3.49 kills per game and 304 kills overall.
Middle hitter Jackson dominated the league in blocking with 102 blocks on the season – almost 30 more than the league’s second–leading blocker, Monterey’s Ben Vasu – for an average of 1.17 blocks per game. Chisolm was fifth in the league in kills with 2.77 per game.
In CCS volleyball, regular season league champions get an automatic bid into the playoffs. Gilroy, which finished second to Monterey in the TCAL Supplemental league, was ranked 19th in the playoff seeding meeting, three spots out of an at–large playoff berth behind San Francisco’s Sacred Heart and Mountain View High. Despite having a better record than several teams that did make the playoffs, Gilroy, which plays in a B–league, was left out.
As it stands, A–league teams get more “points,” which are used in playoff seeding, for the season by playing other A–league teams. Martin said this leads to top A–league teams not wanting to schedule regular season matches with B–league teams because they don’t get points for them.
However, discussion at the seeding meeting led Martin to believe – and hope – that his league’s status may change for next year, particularly because B–league teams like Gilroy and Monterey competed closely with A–league teams this season.
