Stanley Filiaga had a decision to make.
The volleyball-crazed high school sophomore in Olympia, Washington, had been invited to move in with his aunt in Southern California, where he could chase his volleyball dream. Or, he could finish out high school with his friends and family back home.
“I wanted to take the opportunity to be able to get better and go as far as I can,” Filiaga said.
Looking back on his decision two years later, Filiaga knows he made the right call.
In just the second year of varsity volleyball, the Camarillo High senior outside hitter drilled 394 kills, dug up 184 hits, aced 37 serves, had 32 total blocks and amassed 20 assists to lead the Scorpions to a CIF-Southern Section Division 2 semifinals berth. Filiaga was named Coastal Canyon League Most Valuable Player and included on the All-CIF-SS Division 2 first team.
Filiaga finishes his high school career with another accolade as The Star’s Boys Volleyball Player of the Year for the 2025 season.
Filiaga moved into a home in Camarillo just before his junior year with his aunt, club volleyball coach Alo Fasavalu, and cousins Lucky and Neariah Fasavalu. Lucky, who is committed to play volleyball at the University of Missouri, starred at Sierra Canyon last season while Neariah was a key member of the Camarillo girls volleyball team.
The shared passion for the sport in Filiaga’s home away from home helped nurture a growing love for the sport in his heart while he learned the game on the hardwood at Camarillo.
That part came quickly, said Camarillo head coach Stephen Zavala, despite Filiaga’s relative lack of experience playing organized volleyball before moving to California.
“We were pretty much his first entity in the sense of structure and offense — how to run an offense, tempos, all that stuff,” Zavala said. “He was still very green, but I mean, I can’t coach athleticism. I can’t teach it.”
The newcomer’s ability to launch off the floor and soar above the net immediately caught his new coach’s eye.
“It’s a God-given ability,” Zavala said. “You can see pictures of what he does on the court, but you can’t really put it into words. He just kind of takes over a match. There’s really no words for it. It is raw talent at its finest.”
Filiaga first realized his gift in eighth grade.
What he’d thought was an open gym was actually a club volleyball tryout, and Filiaga’s vertical jump was measured. It was at 33 inches — second at the tryout to a high school junior.
Four years later, he’s jumping a stunning 42 inches.
“I realized that I was kind of different from everybody else on the court,” Filiaga said.
The Scorpions’ pin hitter dominated on the outside this season, firing the ball not just past or off the opposing team’s block, but straight over it.
It was a tantalizing skillset for a coach scheming up a game plan on offense.
“We did a summer league in Garden Grove. One of the St. John Bosco guys goes up and it was a mismatch — he just went over the block,” Zavala said. “The player is like, ‘What do I do, Coach?’ (The coach) is like, ‘Jump higher.’ ”
With his parents, Liz and Stanley Sr., serving in the Army, Filiaga moved a lot as a kid. From Washington to Colorado to Germany and back again, he never stuck in the same place for more than five years.
It makes sense that in those brief moments between takeoff and landing, soaring through the air for a kill, the kid who turned his life upside-down one more time to chase this volleyball dream feels most at home.
Nothing else matters — just hit.
“Honestly, it makes me feel free,” Filiaga said. “I feel like I can do whatever I want, whenever I want. I don’t really know how else to describe it. When I’m playing, if I do have a problem, anything that’s going on, it helps me, just playing the game.”
His teammates at Camarillo relied on him in the biggest moments of the season. Against top opponents, Filiaga was steady.
His season-high 26 kills came in the Scorpions’ season opener — a five-set win over Westlake. He logged 13 and 16 kills, respectively, in straight-set victories over rival Royal to clinch the Coastal Canyon League title. In Camarillo’s two CIF-SS playoff games, he erupted for 20 or more kills.
“I think one of the most fun parts about playing outside is the feeling that I’m always being relied on by the rest of my teammates,” Filiaga said, “knowing that, if we were in a situation where we needed take a point, they would want to set me and give me the ball.”
Filiaga turned things up a notch whenever his family was able to catch a flight down from Washington to watch him play, Zavala said. His face lit up when they walked through the gym doors.
“It gave me more motivation to do better,” Filiaga said. “I wanted to show them how I had improved since the last time that they saw me. Showing them that making a sacrifice to move down to California has been worth it.”
That motivation will continue for Filiaga at Santa Barbara City College, where he will play with the hopes of earning a volleyball scholarship to a four-year university. Filiaga said his story is a lesson to anyone who feels they are too late to follow a dream.
“Better late than ever,” Filiaga said. “As long as you work hard and grind it out, you can just get to where you wanna be.”
The Star’s All-County Boys Volleyball Second Team
Dominic Massimino is a staff writer for The Star. He can be reached at dominic.massimino@vcstar.com. For more coverage, follow @vcsdominic on Twitter and Instagram.
This article originally appeared on Ventura County Star: Stanley Filiaga is The Star’s Boys Volleyball Player of the Year
Reporting by Dominic Massimino, Ventura County Star / Ventura County Star
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Dominic Massimino, Ventura County Star | USA TODAY Network
