PHOTOS: Tustin girls make history and bring home first CIF title with win over Vistamar

Tustin’s girls volleyball team and Coach Joanna Lane and other coaches celebrate after winning the CIF title Saturday night. (Photo Tim Burt, OC Sports Zone)

Tustin High’s girls volleyball team set out on a mission Saturday night and was not to be denied.

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The top-seeded Tillers made history, defeating Vistamar in four sets in the Division 5 title match at Tustin, capping the goal that Coach Joanna Lane said she was looking for.

Tustin won the first two sets 25-18, 25-22 before Vistamar came back to win the third set 26-24 to force a fourth set.

However Tustin (27-3) came back to win the fourth set 25-16 setting off a big celebration in the Tustin gym.

It’s the first CIF girls volleyball title for Tustin and Lane said it’s the first CIF crown for any girls team at Tustin. A big crowd, consisting largely of Tustin fans, cheered the Tillers then celebrated with them after the match.

“I almost feel like I’m dreaming,” Lane said. “This is the first time that a girls team can put up a championship banner in the gym for the first time in Tiller history which makes me so proud.”

Tustin had set out before the season to make history and Saturday’s match was just like many others.

“We’ve been playing very composed and really aggressive.,” Lane said. “I think even in that third set, we got down on ourselves a little bit and started to make some errors. Vistamar was a great team, especially with number 10 (Dede Carranza) so I think we just stepped back out there and re-focused and took one point at a time.

“We were not going to be denied. We were going to do everything in our power to pack the stands like we did. We’re just so tremendously proud to be Tillers.”

“I’m completely at a loss of words,” said Tustin’s senior outside hitter Ava McInnes. “But at the same time, I’m so, so proud of our team. This was 100 percent a collective team effort.”

Tustin had to reach for a little extra when Vistamar pulled out the third set.

“I think we definitely lost a little bit of our energy but we came back together and we took a deep breath and our coach said, ‘we got to figure this out’ and we went back on and had more energy and supported each other and we came back,” McInnes said.

McInnes said the Tustin players were also motivated by their home fans.

“It’s something I’ll never ever forget,” she said. “I’ve never seen a school with his much school spirit and they one thousand percent helped us and pushed us the whole way.”

Ava McInnes led Tustin with 13 kills. Her sister, Erin McInnes, had nine kills and Alex Cox and Paige Cutright had eight kills each.. Cutright also had three aces. Junior libero Malia Acosta had 26 digs and Cox had 17 digs. Tustin also had 12 blocks, three by Erin McInnes.

Vistamar (23-3) was led by Carranza, who had 17 kills including some big points in the third set to send the match into a fourth set. Megan Kinney had 24 digs and Britt Lange had 11 kills.

“I thought we played OK, we didn’t play 100 percent like us,” said Coach Sydney Donahue. “I think playing here is ridiculous. I think it should be at a neutral site if it’s the CIF finals. It just didn’t go our way. If CIF is going to have people go all the way to the finals, it should be at a neutral site.”

With a full slate of matches at Cerritos College, CIF officials opted to have some finals at home sites and the Tustin gymnasium was nearly packed with a solid turnout of Vistamar fans taking half of one side of the gymnasium. The other side was filled with Tustin fans. Attendance was estimated at 1,800.

Both teams are headed for the state playoffs beginning Tuesday.

-Tim Burt, OC Sports Zone; timburt@ocsportszone.com