Although Live Oak may having one of its best years on the floor,
it still may not qualify for the Central Coast Section playoffs.
The Acorns, who defeated Salinas 15-2, 15-3, 15-10 on Friday, will
play at Gilroy on Wednesday. If Live Oak wins in Gilroy
’s homecoming, it will be the undisputed Tri-County Athletic
League champion and will have an automatic berth into the
playoffs.
Although Live Oak may having one of its best years on the floor, it still may not qualify for the Central Coast Section playoffs.
The Acorns, who defeated Salinas 15-2, 15-3, 15-10 on Friday, will play at Gilroy on Wednesday. If Live Oak wins in Gilroy’s homecoming, it will be the undisputed Tri-County Athletic League champion and will have an automatic berth into the playoffs.
But a loss would drop Live Oak (22-9, 12-0 TCAL) into a first-place tie with Gilroy (19-8 11-1 TCAL). It would also mean that Gilroy would have won the league tie-breaker and advance automatically to CCS even though Live Oak would have more points. An at-large berth for the Acorns would be a slim shot because of the other area teams ahead in points.
“There’s a little bit of ambiguity,” Telfer said. “It’s an old Monterey Bay Rule and was done under a different type of seeding. But all we have to do is win and we don’t have to worry about any of this.”
After crunching the numbers, Telfer said that Live Oak might be a couple points off of the final seed behind San Lorenzo Valley.
“Maybe they could open it up to an 18-team bracket, which they did three years ago,” Telfer added. “But I don’t think they can do that any more.”
Live Oak (.710) and Gilroy (.704) are ranked eighth and ninth respectively in CCS in overall winning percentages.
“It is kind of maddening that two teams can have that kind of success during the season an not make it because of the scheduling,” Telfer said. “It is too bad that that may be the case.”
Telfer couldn’t say if this year’s team, which is much taller, is better than the undefeated team of 2000, which lost in the first round of the playoffs to Mt. Madonna.
“They are so close but, but so different,” Telfer said. “This team has the most wins of any Live Oak team, but it doesn’t have the best winning percentage.”
“This team has better height and is a better blocking team,” Telfer added. “I think I got just as much of depth in hitting. What it doesn’t have to the level that that team had was the outstanding passing and digging.”
The tallest guy on the 2000 team was Chris Deem’s 6-foot-6 brother Grant. And Grant didn’t play much because he didn’t have the athleticism Chris had, Telfer said. There were a couple 6-foot-1 guys on the team, but that was about all for height. This year there are four players over 6-foot-3. Back row specialist Josh Valdez is the only player short than six feet.
“A little bit has to do with our size – that team was extremely athletic and quick and ran play after play after play,” Telfer said. “This team just says ‘We’re tall, we’re big and we’re going to hit over the top of you.’ There is no one in CCS that has our size.”
“We are starting to run more deception-type plays so they can’t just key on the tall guys,” Telfer added. “Early in the season, we were pretty predicable. We weren’t giving our setters good passes early in the season. Those plays have to be technically perfect with the timing. Lately we have been passing with pinpoint accuracy.”
