NORTHRIDGE — The third time was apparently the charm for the Taft girls volleyball team.
It took the Toreadors two years of participation in the L.A. City Section Open Division final to cross that jinx Saturday. The Angels triumphed in the nail-biting five set against Venice, 22/25 25/17 25/16 17/25 17/15, to clinch the Open title at Cal State Northridge.
This makes Toreadors City champs for the first time since the year hosting of the stretch was initiated in 2014.
“This is the best I’ve ever felt,” said the Toreadors’ head coach Arman Mercado. Besides, we have clinched a couple of championships but this is as good as it can get. This is for every single alumni that didn’t get a championship, not at Taft, but for everybody who bust their ass in the City Section. State games are just a bonus. That we are going to be able to enjoy that but this moment Right Here Right Now is forever.”
When entering the finals, the Toreadors had lost no sets in the playoffs, having won in straight sets in the first two contests.
The Gondoliers sent a message to the Toreadors when they walked away with the first set on Saturday.
The Toreadors were quick to retaliate and subsequently I beat the Aggies in the next two sets. The emphatic wins seemed set Taft to finish off the Gondoliers but the were not ready to throw in the towel.
Offensively the Toreadors could only do this and that. Leading the offense for the Toreads was Aleiah Carr who came through with a team-best 19 kills.
Eva Velarde was claiming nine kills and Colette Ejang and Claudia Aber each eight kills.
In the fifth set alone, Carr registered four kills.
‘I feel overwhelmed,’ Carr went on to say. To be very honest, I kept saying to myself, ‘Lord please don’t let me be a recipient of this runner up medal’. There were underclassmen visibly trembling and I was clinging to them but we aren’t going out empty handed. This team was able to push us over the top, we’ve been here three times. This team has really come to mean so much to me.”
The Gondoliers then specifically began to look the more likely of the two sides to score in the fifth set.
Despite holding a twelfth set lead of 9-12 and Taft was on the defensive and the title seemed to be slipping away from the Gondoliers.
But the essence of the game of an extremely durable team which competed in the finals for three consecutive year came to the fore and Taft equalized the set at 14-all.
The Gondoliers got their chance to secure the match and put points on the board before the Toreadors scored the last 3 points to win the match 3-1.
Some of the outstanding performers in the set for the Toreadors were Francine Baltazar-Shine who set 36 assist.
After all of these ebs and flows of the season, after two years of frustration in the finals, Baltazar-Shine beams with joy even as she claimed the ring.
“I think all our hard work and teamwork, everyone was bought in and this was the result,” said Baltazar-Shine. In essence, the team at the end of the day has faith and confidence in one or many members of the team. This particular moment, this season, my four years in college, will never leave my head or my heart.
