Vista Murrieta girls volleyball team defeats Lakewood to reach Division 1 semis

MURRIETA — Vista Murrieta extracurricular hitter Claire Little is going to get her kills erstwhile she successful the beforehand row. The cardinal for the Broncos is not allowing opponents to spell connected large runs erstwhile Little rotates into the backmost row.

Little was her accustomed ascendant aforesaid Wednesday night, registering a match-high 26 kills, and the Broncos besides outscored Lakewood by six points erstwhile Little was successful the backmost row. That operation helped Vista Murrieta to a 25-23, 25-17, 21-25, 25-15 triumph implicit the No. 3-seeded Lancers successful a CIF Southern Section Division 1 quarterfinal match.

This marks the archetypal clip Vista Murrieta has reached the semifinals successful the Southern Section’s apical part and the program’s archetypal travel to the conception semifinals since 2011 (Division 1A). The Broncos (20-8) question to No. 2 effect Mater Dei (34-4) connected Saturday night, looking to avenge a four-set nonaccomplishment to the Monarchs successful September.

In each of the 3 sets it won Wednesday night, Vista Murrieta outscored Lakewood whenever Little was successful the backmost row. Lakewood (24-4) outscored the Broncos by 2 points with Little successful the backmost successful the 3rd set.

“We are decidedly getting amended astatine it,” Vista Murrieta manager Ed Taitano said astir the team’s quality to debar those large runs. “We person a batch of girls that person stepped into bigger roles arsenic the play has progressed.”

The archetypal acceptable was chock afloat of mini-runs by some teams. Shayna Martinez served up a brace of aces to spark a 5-0 tally that gave Lakewood a 19-16 advantage. Vista Murrieta answered with a 6-1 tally to surge successful front, but Lakewood leveled the people astatine 23 connected an ace by Samarah Decoud. After a timeout, Vista Murrieta reached acceptable constituent connected a work mistake by the Lancers, and past Little closed things retired with a termination conscionable wrong the backmost line.

Little registered 8 kills during the archetypal set, and Beth Bellfi added 5 much kills for the Broncos.

“We had a spot of a unsmooth commencement successful that set, but we each conscionable came unneurotic astatine the close time,” Little said.

Lakewood appeared to summation immoderate momentum successful the 2nd acceptable erstwhile Laura Williams and Jade Epps combined for a brace of worldly blocks connected Little. However, Vista Murrieta answered backmost with a 12-5 tally to regain the lead. Little’s seventh termination of the acceptable enactment the Broncos connected acceptable point, and Abby Jones came disconnected the seat closed the acceptable retired with a kill.

With immoderate of its pin hitters struggling, Lakewood turned to its mediate blockers to get backmost into the match. Keke Hall and Epps combined for 7 kills and nary hitting errors connected their 15 attacks during the 3rd set. Lakewood besides enactment up an effectual artifact successful the 3rd game, forcing Vista Murrieta into 9 hitting errors.

Vista Murrieta trailed aboriginal successful the 4th game, but a brace of aces by Skylar Darr turned things astir for the Broncos. With Lakewood focusing truthful overmuch attraction connected Little, Vista Murrieta setters Lexi Duffy and Nicole Jacob started to dispersed the shot around.

Avery Maddox, a elder right-side hitter, registered 5 of her 8 kills successful the 4th set.

“I deliberation we needed to springiness Claire a spot of break,” Duffy said. “It’s bully to support the different squad guessing.”

Bellfi finished with 10 kills for Vista Murrieta. Lilliana Montes led the blocking effort for the Broncos with 1 solo artifact and six artifact assists.

Hall and Decoud finished with 12 and 11 kills, respectively, for Lakewood. Epps was the starring blocker for the Lancers with 1 solo artifact and six artifact assists.