On Wednesday, the Olympians faced Irvine Valley College who arrived at Mesa College with an unblemished 5-0 record. The Lasers last season finished 2nd in the Orange Empire Conference, and then followed that with a semifinal berth in the CCCAA State Championships. A solid program every year, head coach David Proffitt knew that entering this game would be a great measuring stick for the program. 

Not only did the Olympians play inspired, they defeated the Lasers in five grueling sets 22-25, 25-16, 23-25, 25-18, 15-13.

"When you face programs like Irvine Valley, you have to be prepared from the first point," states head coach David Proffitt. "This was a big win for our program, I believe that this is the first time in our program's history that we've ever beaten Irvine Valley. This should be the standard going forward for San Diego Mesa men's volleyball."

GAME RECAP FROM COACH PROFFITT:

Game 1: This was a close set from start to finish with IVC pulling away in the last couple of points. I was happy with our play and stayed positive going into the second set. Jorge Hernandez got us off to a great start attacking with 3 kills on 6 attempts in the first.

Game 2: We jumped all over them in this set going up 16-6 early. Richard Aguiniga set a fantastic match and particularly this game by racking up 14 assists in this game alone. TJ Letuligasenoa also had a great second game by putting up 7 kills on 9 attempts with zero errors to lead us to a game 2 final score of 25-16.

Game 3: IVC bounced back and held a 2-to-4 point lead early in set three. We rallied to tie the score at 20-20 and I thought we were playing good enough down the stretch to take the game as we gained a late lead at 23-20, but with a couple late passing, digging and attacking errors, we dropped the set to IVC 23-25. Ricardo Lorja had a good game 3 with 3 kills on 4 attempts. Richard Aguiniga also added 11 assists.

Game 4: Richard Aguiniga continued to lead the team with another 10 assists in set 4. We got out to a 4-point lead at 8-4 with a good service run by Santiago Mantovani. We never looked back in this game. IVC closed the gap to two points a couple of times before we closed this game out with a 7-point win.

Game 5: We got out to a slow start in game 5 which is exactly what you don't want in the deciding 5th game since we only play to 15 points. IVC ran out to a 4-8 lead before I called a timeout. 

In the timeout I just reminded the guys that we work on this exact scoring scenario almost every practice. We just need to get one side-out to get the score to 5-8 and then start making a run. The guys responded with a 7-3 run to tie the game at 11.  Richard served a ball in the net to make it 11-12. TJ got a big kill to make it 12-12. IVC made an attacking error to make it 13-12. IVC made another error to make it 14-12. We made a ball handling error to make it 14-13. Austin Kinnear earned us the match winning point with a kill down the line off a set by Richard Aguiniga. 

I believe that this is the first time in our program's history that SD Mesa has ever defeated IVC. While this is significant, I truly believe that this should be the standard going forward for SD Mesa Men's VB. 

Standouts in the IVC match:
Richard Aguiniga: 46 assists, 6 kills on 9 attempts with zero errors, he also lead the team with 10 digs, he also had 4 blocks
TJ Letuligasenoa: 14 kills/2 errors on 35 attempts = .343 hitting efficiency 
Austin Kinnear: 12 kills/6 errors on 33 att. = .182
Ricardo Lorja: 6 kills/1 error on 12 att. = .417