Beach Volleyball State Championship returns to West Valley for an exciting weekend of action

Championships Page (qualifiers, schedule, brackets, etc.)

SARATOGA – The 3C2A Beach Volleyball Championship returns to West Valley College and its beautiful facility for the first time since 2018 with six teams and 32 pairs vying to carry the title of state champion home with them when all is said and done.

Competition in the three-day tournament begins with the team championship on Thursday. After that titlist is crowned, the pairs competition will take center stage on Friday with pool play action. By the end of the day, the field will be whittled down by half, setting up single-elimination bracket play on Saturday to determine the state champions. 

Fans can follow Thursday's team championship action with updated results here. Pairs action will be updated throughout the day on Friday and Saturday as well. Friday's morning wave will be updated here while the afternoon wave can be followed here. Follow Saturday's bracket action here.

Half of the field in Thursday’s team tournament return from last year, including state runner-up Feather River (17-3) which advanced with a pair of 4-1 wins over American River and Fresno City during regional championship play on May 2. The Big 8 Conference champion Golden Eagles will be the North’s second seed behind Coast Conference champion Cabrillo, which beat Sierra (4-1) and West Valley (3-0) to qualify.

SoCal will be represented, in seed order, by Ventura (21-2), Orange Coast (17-2), Santa Barbara City (20-3) and Grossmont (19-6). Ventura brought home the Western State Conference title with an 11-1 mark and Orange Coast was the Orange Empire-Western winner. Santa Barbara was runner-up in the WSC while Grossmont was second in the Pacific Coast Athletic Conference.

All four SoCal qualifiers swept through their regional qualifiers to punch their tickets to Saratoga, including Ventura which had a pair of 5-0 victories to ease its way, and Grossmont, which fought through a pair of tough 3-2 victories.

Cabrillo, Orange Coast and Grossmont will comprise Pool A on Thursday while Ventura, Feather River and Santa Barbara will make up Pool B. The teams in each pool will play each other starting at 9 a.m. with the pool winners facing off for the state championship at the end of the day.

Irvine Valley edged Feather River, 3-2, in an exciting championship last year on the Lasers’ home courts.

Pairs competition will have a familiar tone, at least from last year’s championship match. Emma Crabbe, from Santa Barbara City, teamed with Kelissa Lemoine to win last year’s title but returns to the field with a different partner in 2023, joining this time around with Oliva Medina as SoCal’s fourth-seeded team.

West Valley’s Flor Porras was runner-up to Crabbe/Lemoine last year with Katie Kishton but will team with Kiana Manson as NorCal’s third seed. Natalie Taggart was a semifinalist with Sierra College in 2022 but is now at Cabrillo where she’ll partner with Kelea Saxton as the sixth seed. Grossmont’s Madison Bogle was a semifinalist last year with Lexi Morris but is matched up with Alana Embry after the duo swept through the SoCal Regionals and enter this weekend as the region’s top-seeded team.

Carissa Chainey and Eliana Sheridan begin competition this week as NorCal’s top seed after capturing that regional title.