CCS champ sophomore year, finalist at state the same year.

Early in her high school athletic career, spectators could tell that current senior Kiersten Dolbec was going places. To be exact, she’s going to UCSB in the fall on a full scholarship to both play volleyball and do high jump for the Gauchos track team.

Despite her awe-inspiring performance sophomore year, Dolbec’s junior track season, which is critical for recruitment, was cut short after the CCS preliminary meet when she suffered from appendicitis. Her emergency surgery put her out of CCS finals, and therefore the possibility of a repeat trip to the state meet.

Dolbec was originally recruited only for track and field, based on her impressive record of attending the CCS meet every year and winning the El Camino League championship multiple times, but when the UCSB volleyball coach saw her practice, she immediately became interested in the six-foot athlete.

“I was being recruited for track and all the coaches had to watch me, and the volleyball coach just all of a sudden heard of me,” said Dolbec. “Then she called [my current volleyball coach] and they offered me a scholarship.”

After signing early in the school year, Dolbec trained for the remaining months on the school teams as well as getting outside coaching. Her first summer of freedom outside of high school will also be spent training for the fall.

“This summer I’ll be down at Santa Barbara just playing non-stop volleyball with the team,” said Dolbec.

Her post-college plans, however, have yet to be determined.

“Volleyball would be really hard to [play after college] because the level [of competition] is so high,” said Dolbec, “but track [is more of a possibility] because the qualifying height for the Olympics is 6’4”, which isn’t that far off [from my current jumping height].”