No. 4 Agoura Shows It Can Take a Joke : Girls’ volleyball: Chargers easily advance to Division I quarterfinals by sweeping St. Joseph.

The Jesters?

Aptly named, that girls’ volleyball team from Lakewood St. Joseph High.

Thursday night in a first-round playoff match against Agoura, the Jesters might as well have been wearing pointy shoes and caps with bells. They were overmatched against the Chargers, and after the first game, the match was laughably one-sided.

Agoura, ranked fourth in Southern Section Division I, kept a straight face long enough to advance to the quarterfinals with a 15-9, 15-5, 15-1 victory.

“They’re strong and tall, and we’re, well, short,” St. Joseph Coach Sam Khalaf said.

St. Joseph (19-5) fell behind, 9-0, in the second game and 11-0 in the third. But in the first game, the Jesters came out to prove they were nobody’s fool.

They took a 3-0 lead over Agoura (19-1) and played aggressive defense, digging nearly every Charger spike.

Enthusiasm gave way to ability, however, as Agoura scored the next seven points. Charger outside hitter Jenny Pavley had four kills during the run as Agoura pulled away.

The last two games were never in doubt.

“We came out playing real fired up in the beginning of the second game,” Agoura Coach Chris Everson said.

“The only thing we have to learn is to do it every single point from here on out. We can’t just do it sometimes.”

Two players who played consistently well against St. Joseph were Pavley and middle hitter Diana Wiesbrock.

Pavley had a match-high 19 kills and Wiesbrock had 13 kills and eight blocks.

Senior setter Tammy Barrus led the Chargers with 31 assists in only two games. For the final game Everson replaced Burrus with her sister, Heather, a sophomore.

“She came in and did perfect,” Everson said of Heather, who had seven assists. “Which is good, because it shows our depth--which we may need. We’re a very versatile team, so if one thing’s not working we’re able to go to something else.”

Agoura liberally spread its offense around, with Blair Thomas, Maegan Thomas and Amy Wiesbrock seeing plenty of hitting opportunities, which they generally converted against the Jesters.

“Their block was totally ineffective against us,” Everson said.

So was everything else, with the sometime exception of outside hitter Shannon Buller, who led St. Joseph with 10 kills.

Agoura will face much more serious competition in the quarterfinal round next Tuesday, against fifth-ranked Dana Hills.

But that’s OK with them.

“You play better against better teams,” Wiesbrock said.

And that’s no laughing matter.