M-A sweeps past Burlingame; now tied for first in PAL Bay volleyball standings

Senior outside hitter Dani Eline was on her game, scoring a double-double with 10 kills, 10 digs and three blocks, while recording a .385 hitting percentage.

“It’s a pretty big deal,” Eline said of the win, coming off Burlingame’s five-set victory Sept. 24, in the first PAL Bay matchup between the two teams earlier in the season. “We were super hyped going into it. We lost to Burlingame in five sets last time, so the energy was really high on both sides.”

It was Eline’s persistence in Game 2 that overcame a 22-21 deficit, scoring back-to-back kills to swing M-A ahead. The Bears reloaded with senior Duru Ruacan scoring through the middle for one of her nine match kills to force set point, before Burlingame misfired into the net to close out the set.

M-A’s offense took a finesse approach through the first two sets, but in Game 3 Eline started blasting away.

“It’s our kind of game plan, especially for Burlingame,” Eline said. “It’s because they have the campfire open a lot. For me, I was just getting blocked a lot, so I felt like I kind of had to stick to the soft plays. Then as soon as I could see the holes in the block, I was just going for it. And I was like, if I can hit it hard enough, the [libero] isn’t getting to it.”

With the Bears leading 10-7, she scored her team’s next three points by exacting the backline. Eline later unloaded from the left side to force match point, and Ruacan sealed the win by tooling the block with a rocket through the middle.

The win not only puts M-A in line for a PAL Bay Division title — if both the Bears and Burlingame win out through three remaining regular-season matches, the two would share a league co-championship — it also thrusts the team into the running for a bid to the premier Central Coast Section Open Division postseason tournament.

“That playoff picture, this was really a necessary one, kind of, to capture that co-championship in order to be eligible for the Open Division,” M-A head coach Denny Falls said. “If not, we probably wouldn’t be in consideration. So, this was something we needed on the resume in order to be in contention for that Open Division.”

The Panthers (10-1, 17-6) have two previous wins over M-A this season, including one at the Chandler Invitational tournament at Menlo School. M-A represented the PAL Bay in the CCS Open Division last season, while Burlingame did so in 2022. Since CCS instituted an Open Division bracket in 2016, there has never been more than one Bay Division team to qualify in a given season.

“I think it’s the most important part of high school volleyball,” Falls said. “It’s something where the smallest percentage of players even get to compete in that bracket, at that level. So, I think just being eligible is something that’s very special. It’s unique in itself.”

Both teams looked equally qualified for consideration early in Thursday’s showdown.

The 50-50 balls and second-effort defensive plays were riveting, with M-A gaining an advantage late in Game 1 in winning two jousts before Ruacan scored to put the Bears up 23-19. The point was so contentious, the referees conferred after the point to review several close digs that nearly hit the floor. M-A’s point was upheld, though, and Eline and Sienna Morales — who matched Eline’s team-high of 10 kills — scored back-to-back to finish out the opening set.

Burlingame senior Ella Duong emerged in Game 2, though, to keep it close. Burlingame totaled 15 team kills in the set, with seven of them coming from Duong.

“They shut her down last time,” Korslund said. “They were really blocking her crossbody swings ... so it’s something we’ve really been working on in practice is developing the other side of her game: tipping, swinging deep ... and I think she really put that on display tonight.”

M-A countered with some of the most flawless attacking play you’ll ever see. Falls said he’s set the bar high, insisting his team make no more than four attacking errors a set. Totally zero attacking errors in Game 2 — and not committing one until going up 20-14 in Game 3 — exceeded that goal.

“We were kind of tiptoeing around that figure,” Falls said. “But really targeted this match as one we could punch it through in terms of that goal, limit many of those errors, and start pushing the pressure on the other side.”

“Hats off to them for tough serving, consistent serving,” Korslund said. “There were only a few serving errors, and I think we felt like they were really coming at us, where we weren’t really able to flip the momentum on them. When we were, we weren’t able to sustain it. Playing a team that’s making very few errors is tough mentally, too, as well as physically too.”

Ruacan and junior middle Kayla Greenbaum added three blocks apiece for M-A, while senior middle Sarah Littlefield totaled a team-high four blocks. Senior libero Kiela King matched Eline’s team-high with 10 digs.