Estancia girls’ volleyball serves up another early season sweep

In gyms across the country, the most common of in-game volleyball chants might be “side out.”

Maybe Estancia High girls’ volleyball fans should adopt one dedicated to serving — for instance: “Serves up.”

That facet of the game should be a source of excitement, especially if it is as effective as it was for the Eagles against Santa Ana Valley on Thursday evening.

Sophie Beazley, Lulu Chupeau and Madison Murray each recorded multiple aces, and the Eagles swept the Falcons, 25-15, 25-22, 25-12 in a nonleague game at Estancia High.

Serving had been a point of emphasis for the Eagles (2-0) in their most recent practices. In particular, first-year Estancia coach Rick Reeve was hoping to see his players utilize the technique of short serving. It would come in handy against the Falcons’ wide-ranging libero Gisselle Ibarra, who was able to cover the back of the court by herself.

“That’s one reason that she got rewarded because she got away from (Ibarra),” Reeve said of giving the game ball to Beazley. “That libero was taught to not just take her zone, but to move into a couple of other zones too, because she’s so good.”

“A lot of the girls were not serving to the spots that we wanted to, and their libero was hot, so once we started getting the ball away from her, we started converting.”

Reeve mentioned that he is a huge believer in the concept of momentum. Estancia was able to establish it early in each set against the Falcons (0-2).

Chupeau began the first and second sets by delivering serves that set her teammates up to go on substantial runs. The Eagles opened the first set with a 5-0 lead. In the second, they doubled that feat, securing the first 10 points of the game.

Once she served the ball, Chupeau jumped into the action, where she helped to facilitate the offense as the setter. The freshman ended the match with 26 assists.

“I love serving first because it sets the momentum for everything,” Chupeau said. “I struggled at first being the setter because that’s not my actual position. I learned to like it because I get to set all my friends up.”

A primary beneficiary of Chupeau’s work as the setter was outside hitter Sarah Graham, who notched a team-high 13 kills. She and middle blocker Katelyn Chesemore each recorded 1 ½ blocks.

Despite a 10-0 start to the second game, Estancia ran into trouble in trying to close it out when it earned set point at 24-16. After surrendering six straight points, Reeve called timeout. The mindset was to break that all-important momentum.

“I wanted to kill [the momentum], so I called a timeout for that,” Reeve said. “With the girls, I said, ‘Let’s play fundamental volleyball. We’ve won all these games already. Let’s push for one more point of systematic volleyball, and we’re done.’ ”

The Eagles won the next point on a block by Alex Jimenez, one of four points won by the senior opposite. They then cruised to a straight-sets win.

“It’s awesome for her,” Graham said of Jimenez’s big block. “We’re all really proud of her.”

“I think what we have done at practice is showing on the court. We’re working hard daily and our improvement shows in our games.”

Estancia, who started last season 8-0, opened the 2017 campaign with a sweep over Samueli Academy.

Andrew.Turner@latimes.com

Twitter: @ProfessorTurner