Paly’s varsity volleyball team’s season ended with its first CCS match against Westmont High School on Thursday, Nov. 9. The match, which lasted the maximum five games, ended with Paly losing 2-3.

"I’m disappointed obviously," varsity coach David Huan said. "There are a lot of factors that go into [the loss]."

Paly was ranked sixth in the Central Coast Section playoffs after their loss to Los Gatos on Thursday, Nov. 3. Westmont, who tied for third in the Blossom Valley Athletic League, Mount Hamilton division, was ranked eleventh in CCS, so it was a surprise when Paly lost the match.

In the fifth game, Paly came back from being behind, 8-11, with some brilliant play including a kill by junior middle blocker Ariel Ajagu and a cross court kill by junior outside hitter Lindsey Spiegleman. The score was 14-12 when Paly served out, double hit the ball, and finally hit the ball out of bounds, making the score 14-15. In the end Westmont hit a hard ball that Paly could not return, ending the match with a score of 14-16.
The main problem with the Lady Vikes’ play was the large number of unforced errors. Paly committed 22 service errors in the match, according to Huan.

"We just made too many mistakes," Huan said. "We gave away too many points."

Sophomore Hillary Ford thinks that the team’s ego may have played a part in the match, along with the thrill of playing in CCS.

"We were all really excited because it was our first match of CCS," Ford said. "I think we might have been a little over confident because of our ranking. We should have won that game. We had a good opportunity to go further [in CCS] than last year."

Now that the season has ended, Lisa Spiegleman, mother of junior Lindsey Spiegleman, reflected on the team’s success.

"They did excellent this year," Spiegleman said. "It’s a young team, and a good team. They worked hard and did really well."
Spiegleman lead the team with 17 kills in the match, while Ford and Ajagu tied with 14 kills.

Although Spiegleman had the highest number of kills, it was Ajagu and Ford who were noticed by Westmont players.

"[Ajagu] and [Ford] stood out because they were smart and strong hitters," Westmont defensive specialist Ashley McClintock said.

Ford has high hopes when looking forward to next year’s team.

"Hopefully we will be even better," Ford said. "We’re only losing three seniors and we have a lot of juniors so we should have a strong team [next year]."

Huan said, "We are going to win league [next year]. We had a young team this year, so next year we will have several returning players."