LJ b VB: Hard not to like this team

By Ed Piper

It's hard not to like this La Jolla boys volleyball team.

The Vikings, highly talented, go about their business and don't make claims or taunt the other team. They're likeable people--"good kids", as we would say.

I don't know of another LJHS athletic team in my 14 years covering Viking sports that has been rated this high: Coach Dave Jones' squad has been ranked eighth in the nation by MaxPreps, seventh in California, and first in CIF San Diego Section.

I could be wrong. There are the stellar tennis teams. Other sports have been strong, too.

I feel like I know Nathaniel Gates' family. His parents are friendly, though dad Michael, at 6'7" to my 6'5", can snarl sometimes when it has to do with his kids' competition. (I say this good-naturedly.)

Nathaniel (not "Nate", I learned early on) and fellow hitter Gabe Vargas team up in warm-ups, with Gates dribbling the volleyball behind his back occasionally, Vargas smiling and amiable as well. It's fun to circulate among them and their teammates, clicking flash shots (strictly banned during matches--flashless photography only) as I nudge and cajole Viking players verbally. I haven't been kicked off the fringes of the court during warm-ups yet.

But having never been on a team ranked this high, I like to do a Gestalt, thinking of what it is like to be on the other team and face guys this skilled and dominant.

The Sage Creek players Thursday night, May 12, arrived at the La Jolla gym after a drive through traffic from North County extremely pumped up, vocal, and spirited. They obviously had talked about the Vikings' number-one status, and that to beat them was going to be a Herculean effort.

But, hey, this is high school sports, and high school student-athletes, even this talented, are not as consistent as college athletes, who in turn are not as consistent as pro athletes. Any team might win on any night.

I played on a Moorpark College basketball team that faced the number-one community college team in the state, Compton College. There wasn't any doubt from the beginning of the contest. We got blown out. Al Forney, a 6'5" guard and that year's (1972-73) state Player of the Year, was dunking over us, around us, and especially through us.

What I like about La Jolla's contingent is, they don't wear their pride on their sleeves. I mean pride in the bad sense--"I'm the best, you're nothing." The players act like normal, polite, yet good student athletes. The entire two-plus games I watched, not a single taunt or wiseacre remark was made by Viking players. That is refreshing.

And, as refreshing is Jones' perspective on high school sports, which advocates for the whole student competing for school teams within the community of fellow students and staff. It's a good view to have, healthy for young persons to be nurtured and to flourish.