Glendale Adventist girls’ volleyball tops Providence to share second
BURBANK — With first place in the Liberty League out of reach for the Glendale Adventist Academy and Providence girls’ volleyball teams, the Cougars and Pioneers still had something significant to play for when they met Monday.
Glendale Adventist and Providence competed in the second of two season meetings and were grappling for second place behind Archer.
Behind the steady passing of Liana Salvador, who contributed 36 assists, Glendale Adventist posted a 25-22, 25-16, 25-22 league road win.
Glendale Adventist (17-5, 5-3 in league) and Providence (13-6, 5-3) split the two head-to-head contests. The Cougars and Pioneers, who play in different CIF Southern Section divisions, finished tied for second. Providence recorded a 25-17, 25-19, 15-25, 13-25, 16-14 win against Glendale Adventist on Oct. 3.
The Cougars are ranked third in Division IX and the Pioneers are fourth in Division XIII. The playoff pairings for all 10 divisions will be unveiled Thursday.
“We knew what was a stake here and we wanted to end the regular season on a positive note,” said Glendale Adventist coach Gared Luquet, who got 17 kills from Elyse Knipschild and 15 from Paige Singleton. “We also had our first winning record in league since 2006 and that was a goal to get that.
“We’ve learned a lot and I think we’ve become more confident.”
Glendale Adventist jumped out to an 8-3 lead in the first set on a kill by Knipschild down the right side. Providence closed to within 13-10 on a kill by Talia Patterson, who finished with seven kills and eight digs. A kill by Singleton made it 24-21 and a service error on the Pioneers ended the opening game.
The Cougars dominated early in the second set, taking a 10-3 lead on an ace from Kristine Nicholas. A kill later in the set by Singleton made it 17-6. Nicholas closed out the set with a kill.
Providence showed improvement in the third set. The Pioneers received an ace from Patterson to take a 21-18 lead. However, the Cougars completed the sweep with a 7-1 run. Singleton had three kills in the stretch.
After handing Archer its first and only league loss on Friday, Providence appeared to be in line to win the league title, needing to win its two remaining matches against Pacifica Christian and Glendale Adventist, teams the Pioneers already held wins over, but they lost both matches.
“We’re definitely in a funk now,” Pioneers coach James Jimenez said. “We’re backing into the playoffs and that’s something we didn’t want to do.
“Now that league play is over, maybe we can settle down and relax a bit. We just need to get back to the way we normally do and go from there.”
Glendale Adventist got 14 digs from Camille Pizarro.
Providence received 15 digs and five kills from Giselle Camonayan and 17 assists and six digs from Justine Nuñez.
“We’ve pushed through a lot of things after we just missed making the playoffs last year,” Salvador said. “I think we are definitely more mentally stronger and we have some more experience that maybe we didn’t have last year.”
Twitter: @TCNCharlesRich
