THE BRUINS hold up seven fingers after winning their seventh straight league boys volleyball championship with a sweep of Hercules.

The St. Patrick-St. Vincent High boys volleyball team ran its streak of league championships to seven with a 25-13, 25-23, 25-21 victory over Hercules in Tuesday’s Tri-County Athletic League championship match at the Bruins Lair.

After getting a wake-up call by St. Joe’s in Tuesday’s five-set semifinal, the Bruins achieved their destiny with precision serving, a hard-nosed defense and timely offense from Deo Boongaling, Ryan Villaseran and Mark Perez to fend off a pesky Hercules squad.

“One of our goals from the beginning of the year was to go unbeaten in league for a seventh straight year and it feels great to do it,” said SPSV senior libero John Cuevas, who had a match-high eight aces along with 16 digs. “Now we’ve set a stepping stone for the future to keep winning.”

“We’re continuing on what everybody gave us when they left,” said Boongaling, who had a team-high 11 kills along with 10 digs and a pair of aces.

“We’re proud that we went undefeated this season,” said Perez, who had five kills against the Titans.

The Bruins, who haven’t lost a league match since 2008, had it relatively easy in the opening game, but the Spartans switched gears offensively and started tipping balls into gaps in SPSV’s usually tight defense. The second game remained tight throughout and was tied 23-23 when Villaseran fooled the Titans with a tip and Max King ripped a kill to move the Bruins one game away from the title.

“They were tipping and we were getting burned, but we picked things up and got balls down,” Cuevas said.

“They were tipping us to death and playing the short ball, but we figured it out and got smarter about reading it and defending it,” added SPSV head coach Danette Domecus.

“They were all good, especially in the middle,” Boongaling said of the Titans.

The third game was tied 15-15 until the Bruins (25-9) pulled away for good. Cuevas had a key ace that turned the tide late. Villaseran finished with seven kills and six digs. Anthony Olmes had 17 assists and nine digs, and Dominic Nicolas added 15 assists.

SPSV now awaits seeding for the North Coast Section playoffs. The Bruins had won three straight NCS titles until getting swept by Sir Francis Drake in last year’s Division III championship match.

“We played some pretty tough teams this year and we should have won some of those game that we lost,” Domecus said. “I think that scare we got against St. Joe’s may have taught us a lesson and now we’re ready for NCS.”

“We just need to play as a team,”Cuevas said.

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