Capuchino runs down PAL Ocean volleyball crown

And with a small army of Lehauli’s family friends among the capacity crowd in the Capuchino gymnasium, the chant of: “Sina! Sina! Sina!” rained down on the Mustangs’ heroine.

“Honestly, it was overwhelming, but heartwarming as well,” Lehauli said. “I’m just really happy and really grateful for everyone that came out today and stayed for five sets. It’s incredible.”

But a savvy and scrappy San Mateo squad nearly succeeded in taking Lehauli out of the equation. The second-place Bearcats (12-2, 18-8) were playing for a shot at sharing the league title with Cap. And they weren’t about to go quietly.

While Lehauli opened with a dominant showing — using her powerful hook-shot swing to score eight kills in Game 1 — the senior was held to just three kills over the next three sets.

The problem for Lehauli was the Mustangs were getting stuck in rotations with her off the court. But, in Game 5, with Cap head coach Allen Lau moving his mid-rotation lineup into a starting role for the abbreviated race to 15, Lehauli found herself in the starting lineup for the final set.

“Before the fifth set, we were stuck in a rotation that we know is vulnerable,” Lau said. “And then we couldn’t get out of that rotation, so Sina can’t get back in. So, that’s why in the fifth set I changed the rotation to have Sina start for us. So then at the 10 points she’s going back in. So, that had an impact on the game, fortunately.”

San Mateo’s hot hand, opposite hitter Olivia Salles, was consistent throughout. The 6-1 junior scored a match-high 24 kills, including eight in Game 3 to help turn the match around.

Cap, after winning the first two sets, had match point at 24-22 in Game 3. But Salles counted with two varying looks — a long cross shot to make it 24-23, followed by a tip around the block to tie it 24-24 — before capping the Bearcats’ 4-0 run with a sharp spike off the right side to win it.

Then in Game 4, San Mateo’s secret weapon Sarah Boncore settled in after a slow start. Battling through a back injury, Boncore totaled just one kill through the first three sets. She’d go on to total seven kills on the night, including four in a back-and-fourth Game 4, that saw nine lead changes, with Cap leading as late as 23-22.

“We just had to get her going and get her in the right mindset,” San Mateo head coach Andoni Javellana said. The difference when the 6-foot sophomore is one the court, he said, is: “Huge. Bigger block, heavier swing. She’s a tough little player when she’s ready.”

Boncore tied Game 4 at 23-23 with a tight cross shot off the left side. Then San Mateo senior middle Claire Kuziemko put down back-to-back kills to end it, forcing a winner-take-all Game 5.

The Bearcats raced out to a 6-3 lead in the final set, but Cap followed with a 6-1 run, sparked by the left-side play of senior Ava Caruso. The senior finished with 14 match kills, including three in the final set.

Cap — riding the defensive brilliance of senior libero Ellie Wang, who was recording two or three digs per rally consistently through Game 5 — was looking comfortable with a 13-10 lead. But just as the Bearcats had shown earlier in the match, they weren’t about to go away quietly. A quick 4-0 run with Salles belting two kills to tie it 13-13, followed by one of senior Kayli Fong’s 13 kills on the night, and San Mateo was sitting on match point.

The Bearcats twice forced match point, but both times followed by committing service errors.

“It’s tough,” Javellana said. “Those are the ones where it’s fully in our control, and we’d like to be a little bit tougher where that’s concerned. But it’s a learning process.”

Cap responded with a potent attack off the right side. Sophomore opposite hitter Sophia Cancianti scored 16 match kills, but none were more important than the two she scored in extra-points during the final set, working inside of the San Mateo block.

“They had a lot of tall blockers, so I had to work around that,” Cancianti said.

Cancianti’s back-to-back kills swung the advantage to Cap at 17-16. Then a prolonged rally saw Mustangs setter Alessia Perez pivot off the hot hand of Cancianti to find Lehauli off the left side.

“She had the hot hand and I think I just wanted to feed it to her,” Perez said. “She was on from the beginning. She has a huge crowd, a huge personality, and just her specifically getting kills pumps us up.”

And Lehauli’s game-winning kill set off a celebration as Cap’s fans stormed the court to mark the historic accomplishment — the Mustangs’ first-ever PAL championship, and their first overall league title since 1954 in the Mid-Peninsula League.

“This win is a confidence builder for the playoffs,” Lau said. “We don’t know who we’re going to play. But this win is a big, big, dramatic leap for Capuchino girls’ varsity volleyball. They’ve taken it to a level that we’ve never been before. We have a winning record, we are undefeated 14-0, we are the league champion. It’s never been done before as far as I know. So, it’s very important to the school. It’s very important for the players, and the team that did it — and we may get a banner out of it too.”