Back Bay rivals to meet for OC Championships boys’ volleyball title

Sunset League play begins next week in boys’ volleyball, but Saturday provided a sort of preview at the Orange County Championships.

Three of the four semifinal teams in the Gold Bracket at Edison High — Newport Harbor, Huntington Beach and Los Alamitos — were from the league. The fourth, Corona del Mar, is joining the Sunset League next season.

“I wish more teams from Orange County would play, but for whatever reason, they don’t,” Newport Harbor coach Rocky Ciarelli said. “This tournament has been around since 1974, and everybody has always played in it. All of a sudden, the last couple of years, I don’t know why [teams aren’t]. It would be nice if we had the top 32 teams here, instead of 16, but that’s how it goes sometimes.”

How it will go for the undefeated Sailors on Monday night is that they will play a Back Bay rival for the Orange County Championships title.

Newport Harbor (15-0) beat Los Alamitos 25-18, 25-20 in one semifinal before CdM (11-2) topped Huntington Beach, 25-19, 25-13 in the other. The defending tournament champion Sailors, top-ranked in CIF Southern Section Division 1, will play No. 5 CdM for the title Monday at 6:30 p.m. back at Edison High.

Senior outside hitter Cole Pender had seven kills and three service aces against Los Alamitos, leading a balanced attack. Junior opposite Jack Higgs had five kills, while junior Dayne Chalmers, sophomore Caden Garrido and senior middle blocker Ethan Talley each had four.

Chalmers, Ryan Schroeder and setter Joe Karlous each had three digs for the Sailors, who went on a 9-2 run to end the first set after the score was tied at 16-16. Chalmers hit a cross-court kill into the back right corner, before back-to-back aces from Pender ended the set.

The Sailors, who won the Best of the West tournament in San Diego last weekend, have been playing at a high level.

“I can’t complain, you know, especially for early in the season,” said Ciarelli, whose team beat Edison 25-11, 25-17 in the quarterfinals behind nine kills from Pender. “We’ve got a good balance in our offense. We do all of the skills well, so I’m pretty happy. There’s definitely room for improvement, that’s for sure … [but] we’ve been pretty consistent in both of these tournaments.”

Corona del Mar outlasted Lakewood on Saturday morning at Newport Harbor, 25-14, 20-25, 15-8 to win its pool. The Sea Kings then got past Tesoro in a tournament quarterfinal, 25-15, 25-15, behind seven kills from Brandon Browning and five from fellow senior Kevin Kobrine.

Adam Flood led the Sea Kings with eight kills in the semifinal win over Huntington Beach. Matt Olson had three kills and six block assists, and Diego Perez dished out 17 assists.

“The team’s still trying to figure out their identity for this year,” CdM coach Steve Conti said. “We’ve got some guys coming back from last year’s team, but each team has to kind of form their own identity. Right now, when we get leads or win a set, we tend to relax a little bit … We were up 16-9 in the quarterfinals [of the Best of the West tournament against Cupertino Monta Vista] and we ended up losing that [second] set, and ended up losing in three.

“Sometimes it’s easier to be the hunter than the hunted. I think after winning [the CIF Southern Section Division 1 title] last year, we’re the hunted, right? And it’s easier to be a little bit more complacent.”

Mitchell Bollinger led Huntington Beach with seven kills in the semifinal, while Ryan Bevington made three blocks. The Oilers had beaten Esperanza 25-17, 25-13 in a quarterfinal.

“We’ve got some work to do, to get where we want to be by the end of the season,” Oilers coach Craig Pazanti said. “It’s hopefully a good kind of wake-up call to the guys, just to know that we’ve got a long way to go … Give [CdM] credit. They kept the pressure on us.”

The Sea Kings hope to do the same against the Sailors on Monday night. Kobrine said he expects a good match.

“Arguably, two of the best teams in Orange County and the state,” Kobrine said. “They won OC Champs last year, so we have to come in with the mindset of dethroning them. We’re the underdog right now, but I think we can still beat them.”

matthew.szabo@latimes.com

Twitter: @mjszabo