Boys sand volleyball has been offered at Laguna for only three years. Sand volleyball is not an official CIF sport yet, so our team is considered a club team.

According to Coach Jon Roberts this means that, “it is an experimental sport that will probably become a CIF sport in the future.”

This year’s boys sand volleyball team worked hard. The team is very young, consisting of four freshmen, seven sophomores, two juniors and one senior.

When sole senior Mathew Goldsholl was asked how he felt about having such a young team, he said, “They are all very good, and I appreciate that.”

Sophomore standouts Sam Stegall and Andrew Tolles were the number one duo competing on the sand volleyball team.

Junior Spencer Rycroft and sophomore Kyle Aitcheson made up the number two team and Goldsholl and sophomore Oliver Heyer were number three.

The boys have an overall all record of 1-5. One of the team’s biggest highlights of its season was beating Santa Barbara High School 3-0 in a tournament in San Luis Obispo.

“We typically do not play Santa Barbara, Dos Pueblos, San Marcos, or any of the big public schools number one, two and three teams. We play their four, five and six teams,” coach Roberts said.

However, despite our schools size, our boys play extremely competitive matches against these public high school teams.

This sport is also recognized by Laguna’s team as very enjoyable. Goldsholl stated he “really likes playing beach volleyball,” adding, “I like playing two man. I like how you get to touch the ball a lot, and I also think it’s great preparation for indoor season.”

As boys sand volleyball becomes more popular and soon gains its place as an official CIF high school sport, the future of Laguna Blanca’s sand volleyball team is bright. With only one senior graduating there will be many returning players next year.

Roberts looks forward to the future of not only the development of boys sand volleyball at Laguna, but also the growth of boys sand volleyball across the nation and world. “We’re getting better. The biggest positive and bigger picture is that now, finally, we have an area where men’s volleyball is thriving and I think its great to see these guys out here every day contributing to that,” Roberts said.