SOCAL REGIONAL PLAYOFF BRACKET
The Pasadena City College women's volleyball team earned a number of accolades as it enters the postseason for the eighth straight season under head coach Mike Terrill.
The Lancers (19-6) were ranked #14 on the final regular season State Top 25, then picked up the #12 seed for the upcoming Southern California Regional Playoffs. PCC will play at #5 Santa Monica on Tuesday, Nov. 25 (6 p.m.) in a Round 2 match.
Bobbie Torres led a group of Lancers on to the All-South Coast Conference North Division team as the league's Freshman of the Year. An outside hitter, Torres averaged a team-high 2.93 kills per set with 2.75 digs and 32 aces as PCC's top overall player in the regular season.
Joining Torres on the SCC North First Team were freshman middle blocker Delaney Blied, a CCCWVCA State Player of the Week earlier in the season, sophomore libero Juyeon Lee and frosh outside hitter Payton Scott.
The 6-foot-1 Blied averages 1.97 kills with a team-best .372 hitting percentage and leads the squad in solo blocks (29). Lee averages 3.74 digs and is approaching the 500-dig milestone for her 2-year Lancers career. She paces the team in service aces with 42 and added 98 set assists. Scott is second on the team in kills (200, 2.82 average per set).
Making the SCC North Second Team were sophomore middle blocker Savannah Curtis (1.2 kills, 0.76 blocks per set), freshman opposite Izzy Taylor (1.65 kills), first-year defensive specialist Jayleen Almaraz (1.91 digs, 23 aces), and sophomore outside hitter Sabiya Esquivel, her second time named all-conference after earning honors in her 2021 freshman season. Esquivel has become a solid reserve in the rotation as she averages a kill and a dig per set while serving 22 aces. Curtis also is a a 2-time, All-SCC selection.
PCC could be in a good position in playing against the Corsairs, the Western State South Division champions, ranked #7 on the state poll at 24-4. The Lancers edged SMC in five sets on Sept. 5 at PCC in ending Santa Monica's 8-match undefeated streak at that time. All-State middle blocker Nicole Lankton had 19 kills and 12 digs to pace SMC in that encounter while Torres (14 kills, 22 digs), Blied (10 kills, hit .500), Scott (16 kills) and Lee (13 digs, four aces) all were playing at a high level for the Lancers.
If Pasadena gets by Santa Monica, it would move on to the regional finals on Saturday, Nov. 29 against an opponent to be determined. Santa Barbara City currently is the #4 seed in that part of the bracket and the Vaqueros face the winner of this Saturday's #13 Golden West v. #20 Citrus Round 1 playoff on Tuesday.
Pasadena has had a long drought in making it to the state tournament, last reaching the coveted Elite Eight back in 1995 when it finished a program-best third place. Sarah Goodlaw, Gina Punaro, and Mary Morgan are all PCC Hall of Famers who played on that historic team.