![\"Mission](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/PBM-L-MBHS-volleyball-3.jpg\")
Mission Bay High School senior #2, Gia Harder sets the ball during the Oct. 2 game against Lincoln High School. Focused on the play is #7 junior Aubrey Albarian, with Coach Barbara Birnbaum observing on the sidelines. (David Albarian)<\/p>\nWith a 20-16 record as it headed into the Division II CIF playoff game against Granite Hills on Oct. 28, Mission Bay High\u2019s women\u2019s volleyball team was \u201cplaying well and feeling confident,\u201d according to its coach.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have a lot of depth on our team in every position and have received valuable contributions from all 14 players on our roster,\u201d said Coach Barbara Birnbaum. \u201cReally feeling good about our team and our playing heading into playoffs.\u201d<\/p>\n
While the game did not end the way the Buccaneers had hoped, the final score was 2-3 in favor of the Granite Hills Eagles and their season ended 20-17, Birnbaum said she had a talented \u201cfront five\u201d leading the team.<\/p>\n
They were seniors Gia Harder, Ava Mirabelli, Brynn Sloan and Kalea Anderson and junior Audie Caban.<\/p>\n
\u201cEach of these five have made outstanding contributions to our 2025 winning season,\u201d Birnbaum said. \u201cThey have amassed impressive stats.\u201d<\/p>\n
For example, during the week of Oct. 13 Harder achieved 1,000 assists, a rare and impressive accomplishment for setters.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn volleyball an assist is when a player sets the ball up for another player to slam the ball back against the opposing team with such force that it can not be returned,\u201d Birnbaum said.<\/p>\n
When this happened, Mission Bay earned a point and Harder was credited with an assist.<\/p>\n
Mission Bay High School senior #2, Gia Harder sets the ball during the Oct. 2 game against Lincoln High School. Focused on the play is #7 junior Aubrey Albarian, with Coach Barbara Birnbaum observing on the sidelines. (David Albarian)<\/p>\n
Harder, the varsity team\u2019s co-captain, was in the top-25 in CIF San Diego Section for assists. Harder said she enjoys playing indoor and outdoor volleyball at Mission Bay as well as playing club volleyball in the off season. With a full International Baccalaureate course load, Harder said she would like to attend the University of Oregon and perhaps major in business.<\/p>\n
Anderson was one of the two primary setters on the varsity team and was ranked in the top 45 in CIF San Diego for assists. She has played on varsity for three years and committed to Occidental College to play volleyball next fall.<\/p>\n
Sloan was a defensive specialist during her second year on varsity. She was frequently assigned as the team libero and was the team leader in digs. A libero is a specialized defensive position focused on receiving serves and digging attacks. In volleyball a dig is a maneuver to prevent a hard hit ball from the opposing team to score a point. A successful dig sets up the team for a successful offensive attack.<\/p>\n
Sloan led the team with 290 digs heading into the playoffs.<\/p>\n
\u201cI want to attend University of Oregon or University of Washington, somewhere rainy, to study sports business with a minor in sports media\/photography,\u201d Sloan said.<\/p>\n
Mirabelli, an IB diploma candidate, started playing volleyball the summer before her freshman year, playing indoors and outdoors, the latter being beach volleyball, as well as club volleyball. This was her second year on varsity and she went into playoffs with 172 kills.<\/p>\n
A kill is a statistic that describes a maneuver in volleyball that results in the ball hit over the net with such force or with such accuracy that it can\u2019t be returned by the opposing team.<\/p>\n
![\"Mission](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/PBM-L-MBHS-volleyball-1.jpg\")
Mission Bay High\u2019s 2025 varsity women\u2019s volleyball team. Seated senior Gia Harder, sophomore Ema Redzepagic, juniors Annabella Capalbo and Nala Flores, and seniors Fiona O\u2019 Neill and Kalea Anderson. Middle row \u2013 junior Ayanna Poole, seniors Brynn Sloan, Ava Mirabelli senior Hunter Hobson French and junior Aubrey Albarian. Back row \u2013 Coach Barbara Birnbaum, juniors Kaylee Dowell, Clare Steinemann and Audie Caban and assistant coaches Mina Orlic and Alee Pestana. (Yary Photography)<\/p>\n
With Caban being a junior and co-captain of the varsity team, she has one more year of playing as a Buccaneer. She started playing volleyball at the end of eighth grade.<\/p>\n
\u201cI chose Mission Bay as a high school because of its strong IB program and of the close bond I was forming with the girls on the volleyball team,\u201d Caban said.<\/p>\n
From December to July she also plays club volleyball and does strength training and lifting to continue to improve her volleyball performance.<\/p>\n
\u201cAudie is the blocks leader (116 blocks), that\u2019s number 1 in all of CIF San Diego Section,\u201d Birnbaum said. \u201cShe is also our team and league kills leader (388 kills) \u2013 she\u2019s in top four for all of San Diego Section CIF for total kills.\u201d<\/p>\n
Caban added, \u201cI love volleyball because it\u2019s truly a team sport and everyone has to work together to win. It\u2019s also so exciting to get a really good kill or block and I love the energy that my team has.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Mission](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/PBM-L-Mission-Bay-volleyball.jpg\")
Mission Bay High\u2019s women\u2019s volleyball team wore pink shirts during their Oct. 7 game as part of their annual \u201cDIG PINK\u201d event to raise awareness about breast cancer. (David Albarian)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"With a 20-16 record as it headed into the Division II CIF playoff game against Granite Hills on…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":360060,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5134],"tags":[5229,1582,276,65241,175089,24152,3549,7264,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-360059","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-diego","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-california","11":"tag-mission-bay-high-school","12":"tag-mission-bay-high-womens-volleyball","13":"tag-pacific-beach","14":"tag-san-diego","15":"tag-sandiego","16":"tag-united-states","17":"tag-united-states-of-america","18":"tag-unitedstates","19":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","20":"tag-us","21":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115503473273950068","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360059","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=360059"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360059\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/360060"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=360059"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=360059"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=360059"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}