A young College of the Redwoods volleyball team showed some promise and plenty of balance in their season openers in Santa Rosa on Friday afternoon.

The Corsairs fell to the hosts in three sets in their opener (25-19, 25-17, 25-18), but pushed a quality Yuba team all the way in a five-set loss later in the day (26-24, 25-14, 17-25, 24-26, 11-15).

“The difference was we had a lot of freshmen on the court and half of their team were returning, but it was really good actually,” said head coach Petra Lorenzi, who has just one returning player on her roster of 11. “It showed us a lot. Most of all it showed that we’re going to be a strong team this year.”

Several players had promising debuts for the Corsairs, including Arcata High graduate Abby Costello-Anderson, who impressed in both matches and finished with 27 kills on the day.

Against the Bear Cub,s Perla Ceballos and Mandy Yoshizawa each had a team-high nine digs while Heavenn Fults added eight.

Mia Holcomb also had an immediate impact in her CR debut and had a double-double against Yuba, finishing with 41 assists and 15 digs.

Ceballos continued to impress defensively against Yuba and finished with 14 digs, while Maile Kapahu also had 14 digs.

Zoe Zerlang, the lone returning player on this year’s team, had 17 kills.