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When the Mater Dei girls volleyball team plays Marymount in the CIF-SS Division 1 final on Saturday night, the Monarchs will be facing … well, maybe Monarchs coach Dan O’Dell sums it up best.
“In my nine years of coaching high school volleyball, they may be the best team I’ve seen,” O’Dell said after the Monarchs won their semifinal to set up a showdown with the undefeated Sailors in the D1 final at Mira Costa High School in Manhattan Beach.
O’Dell isn’t the only observer with a very high opinion of the team from the all-girls school located near the UCLA campus.
The Sailors (30-0) are ranked No.1 in the nation, finished first in two elite national tournaments and dropped only five sets all season.
Mater Dei (35-4) comes in ranked No. 2 in the CIF Southern Section, No. 2 in the state and No. 3 in the nation.
Marymount and Mater Dei faced off once this season, with the Sailors sweeping the Monarchs, 2-0, in the final of the Durango Fall Classic in Las Vegas on Sept. 18.
“They are just really good at every position,” said O’Dell, who has guided the Monarchs to an eighth consecutive appearance in a Southern Section final and is vying for a fourth championship. “It’s really hard to pinpoint a weakness.”
The Sailors are exceptional with first contacts and have an outstanding setter in Stanford commit Kelly Belardi, O’Dell said.
To compete against the Sailors, Mater Dei will need flawless first and second contacts on their end, the coach said.
Rather than allowing the Sailors to consistently attack and be the aggressor, the Monarchs will need to “push back,” O’Dell said.
“That’s got to be the goal, to not let them dictate who is the one that is constantly attacking the other person.”
O’Dell is counting on the Monarchs’ three passers, Jordyn Schilling, Malyssa Cawa and Babi Gubbins, to get the ball to hitter Shanelle Puetz.
“In order to be great, we have to be able to get her the ball where she needs it,” O’Dell said. “The consistency with those three passers has got to be a key for us.”
Mater Dei’s depth has been huge part of the team’s success.
The Monarchs have multiple hitters who can score and don’t have to depend on a single player to wrack up most of the kills.
“That is what makes us tough,” O’Dell said. “You don’t really know who to focus on in certain situations.”
Psychologically, going into the game as an underdog, takes away much of the pressure, the coach said.
In fact, a key to the team’s preparation this week has been getting the players to embrace the role of an underdog.
“They have the pressure of maintaining an undefeated season, which is difficult to do, especially at this level,” O’Dell said. “We’re not the ones who are the favorites here. To me, the pressure is on their side of the net.”
O’Dell said the Monarchs have been playing their best volleyball of the season and are not the same team Marymount saw in the Durango Fall Classic.
“They haven’t played a team as good as us when we are playing the way we can play,” he said. “So, they’re going to have to be prepared to face a team that is going to be the best team that they have seen at this point.”
This post first appeared on ocregister.com
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