By Jeff Weisinger
Editor-in-Chief
It wasn’t pretty by any means, however, the Ohlone Volleyball team clinched a big win against San Jose City College in five sets Wednesday night, ending a three-match losing streak.
The Lady Renegades (5-11, 2-9) defeated the Lady Jags back on Oct. 21 at San Jose in five sets, however Wednesday night’s rematch seemed all too familiar to Head Coach Jeremy Peñaflor and his Ohlone squad.
“That was probably one of my biggest fears: a recurrence of last time,” Peñaflor mentioned. “Literally, picture perfect.”
Just like the Oct. 21 matchup, Ohlone jumped out to an early 2-0 lead, winning the first two sets 25-17 and 25-23.
“We’re pretty equally matched up,” said Lady Jags Head Coach Tait Rafat. However, SJCC would come back and take advantage of numerous miscues and miscommunication by the Lady Renegades and, again, fought back in the third and fourth sets, taking those 25-23 and 25-17, including ending the fourth set on an 11-4 run.
“We just started getting hard on ourselves,” said Lady Renegades opposite hitter Kayla McManus. “It just happened with everybody and we ended up losing. We just had to shake it off.”
“The first two games, we went off and we wanted it,” said sophomore middle blocker Kelly Idle. “In the last two, they wanted it more than we did, so it came down to a battle. We came back, that’s all you can say.”
The Lady Renegades had to do just that in the fifth and final set – come back.
Unlike the last time these two teams met, where the fifth set was a back and forth battle, Ohlone found themselves down 10-4, struggling to find any consistency.
That is, until server Rachael Miramontez subbed in for Idle with Ohlone down six.
Miramontez, who’s been battling an ankle injury for the past few weeks, sparked a rally for the Lady Renegades, who went on an 8-1 run in her shift.
“I was nervous,” Miramontez said. “I didn’t play all game, I was not warmed up and I was just nervous. So I brought all I could bring.”
“Props to her,” McManus said. “Her serves are ‘crazy-good.’ She came in and she did what she had to do.”
Down 10-9, Miramontez helped the Lady Renegades tie the game, making a huge dig that helped Ohlone make the kill to make the game 10-all. The Lady Jags had two kills go out and down 14-12, San Jose’s serve flew out of bounds, giving the win to the Lady Renegades.
“In game five, whomever gets going usually wins the game,” Rafat added.
The win for Ohlone is just their second conference win, doubling their confrence win total from last year. Ohlone will take on the Rams from the City College of San Francisco on Wednesday, Nov. 18 at 6:30 p.m. in the regular season finale.
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