Warriors reach CIF volleyball championship match

Joe Naiman

Village News Reporter

For only the second time in the history of the Fallbrook High School girls volleyball program, the Warriors reached the CIF championship match.

Fallbrook won three playoff matches to earn a berth in the CIF Division III final Nov. 6 at Cathedral Catholic High School. Bonita Vista won the CIF championship with a 25-17, 25-19, 25-18 victory over Fallbrook.

“I’m extremely proud of them for reaching that game and being there,” said Fallbrook coach Chip Patterson. “It’s been 25 years since Fallbrook’s even been in the championship.”

The path to the championship match included a win over top-seeded Christian in the semifinal match. “That was amazing that we did all those things,” Patterson said.

Fallbrook, whose regular-season record was 18-11 including 8-2 in Valley League play for second place in the standings, was given the fourth seed in the CIF Division III playoffs. The Warriors hosted 13th-seeded Montgomery in the first-round match Oct. 27 and advanced to the quarterfinals with a 25-14, 25-17, 25-18 victory. “I think we kind of underestimated those girls. They put up a fight,” Patterson said.

“Those girls did an outstanding job,” Patterson said of the Aztecs. “They made us work, really, until the last set.”

Patterson had hoped to provide playing time for his substitutes against the Aztecs, but the Montgomery successes limited that. “I played my starters more than I wanted to,” he said.

In 2016, Fallbrook also defeated Montgomery in the first round of the CIF playoffs, which was the Warriors’ previous post-season victory.

The quarterfinal match at home against Granite Hills was contested Oct. 30. The Eagles won the 25-22 first set. Fallbrook countered with a 25-18 triumph in game two. The third game ended as a 25-18 Granite Hills victory. A 25-20 Fallbrook win in the fourth game sent the match to a fifth set.

The Eagles had a 7-4 lead during the fifth game. “They even had us at one point,” Patterson said. “We had to make a run on them.”

Fallbrook overcame the deficit and won by a 15-11 margin. “They came to play,” Patterson said. “That night they were all over and there was no stopping them.”

The victory put Fallbrook into the CIF semifinals for the first time since 2006. “To win that game at home, it was pretty amazing to see,” Patterson said. “They showed that they were on their way to something special.”

The semifinal at Christian took place Nov. 3. “It wasn’t pretty at first,” Patterson said.

The Patriots began the match with a 25-21 victory. Fallbrook won the second game by a 26-24 overscore. “We were playing out of position,” Patterson said.

The win while playing out of position may have been of benefit to the Warriors. “I told them that if we were playing out of position we could do anything,” Patterson said.

Christian won the 25-14 third game, but a 25-16 Fallbrook win in the fourth set created the winner-take-all fifth game.

“The fifth game they had us 8 to 4,” Patterson said. “We rallied back, and it was amazing.”

The rule that a team must win a game by two points was incorporated into the final game. “We were going back and forth,” Patterson said.

With a 16-15 Fallbrook lead, Christian’s attempt to return a dig ended with a shot into the net to give the Warriors a 17-15 win and a berth in the CIF final. “We weren’t going to give in and let them have that game,” Patterson said.

Christian had entered the match with a 17-0 record at home. “They ended up being 17 and 1 at home,” Patterson said.

Bonita Vista was the second seed. The match was also the first-ever CIF San Diego Section championship volleyball match with two African-American head coaches; Patterson’s Bonita Vista counterpart is Ahmad Rice. “That was pretty amazing,” Patterson said. “You just don’t see a lot of African-American coaches in volleyball, you really don’t, not in the high schools.”

Fallbrook’s only other CIF championship appearance was in 1996, when the Warriors were in the CIF Division I final. Fallbrook’s coach that year, Heather Schulte, attended the 2021 championship match.

The CIF did not adopt “rally scoring,” in which a point is given for a side out, until 2003. The 1996 final between Fallbrook and Rancho Buena Vista was a 16-14, 11-15, 15-9, 15-11 Longhorns win. The Rancho Buena Vista coach, Tom Saunders, was the head coach of Fallbrook’s boys volleyball team from 2006 to 2008. Patterson has been the Warriors’ head boys coach since 2014, although he knows Saunders from his wife rather than from Fallbrook volleyball. “Tom trained my ife as a 13-year-old to an 18-year-old. She played for his club team,” Patterson said.

Patterson’s wife, Leilani, graduated from El Camino High School and played for the North County Juniors and San Diego Juniors volleyball clubs Saunders coached. Patterson, his wife and their children moved from Oceanside to Fallbrook in 2011.

Bonita Vista deprived the Warriors of their first CIF girls volleyball championship. “It just seemed like we couldn’t string it together,” Patterson said.

“The passing wasn’t there,” Patterson said. “We just didn’t execute well. We played hard, but we returned a lot of balls that were out. We served out and we made serving errors at crucial times.”

Patterson also credited Bonita Vista’s defense. “They had a great libero,” he said. “She seemed to touch every doggone ball.”

The loss in the CIF finals gave Fallbrook a season record of 21-12, giving Fallbrook more than 20 victories in a season for the first time since 2016. “I think that these girls, they have the potential to surprise a lot of teams,” Patterson said.