GREENCASTLE — Greencastle-Antrim’s girls volleyball team had its biggest challenge on Thursday night in a home match against Chambersburg.
The Blue Devils, who came into the match 7-0 without having lost a game all season, got ahead by edging the Trojans 25-23 in the first set.
Cami Bender
But Chambersburg (5-2) came back to squeak out a 26-24 win in Game 2, and then kept it rolling, taking wins in the third set (25-18) and fourth (25-21) to win the non-league clash 3-1.
“We played with a lot of heart tonight, especially after losing a tight first set,” Trojan coach Ty Frelin said. “We stayed aggressive and did the little things that we needed to do to beat a solid Greencastle team. It was a high level volleyball match.”
G-A coach Madee Goodwin said, “It was such an entertaining match and we knew it’d be tough for the girls. Chambersburg is such a tall team and we had to be big on our blocks. They swung hard and were able to find some holes.”
The Blue Devils ran their winning streak of games this year to 22 with the win in the first set.
Goodwin said, “Jordyn Wagner (5 kills) had some big blocks for us early.”
But then the Trojans came back to take a close win in the next game.
Jordyn Wagner
Frelin said, “After we won the second set, I told the girls that was their first loss of set this year. And I think that gave them incentive to play well in the last two.”
In Game 3, Riley Evans put together a run of service points to give Chambersburg a lead that it carried to a win. In set No. 4, Cami Bender did the same thing, sprinkling in a few of her 6 aces for a big service run.
“Neither team really had any long runs except for those two,” Frelin said. “I think those were the difference — we were able to string together a couple of runs and our defense played well enough that we didn’t let them do that to us.”
Goodwin agreed, saying, “It was a very back-and-forth match, but they did have those two 5- or 6-point runs and our girls struggled to get the momentum back.”
Alayna Jones and Marah Lehman led Chambersburg, winners of four straight, with 13 kills each and Evans had 7. Evans (4) and Nizaya Hawkins (2) led in blocks. Bender ended up with 14 points, Jones had 10 and Evans scored 8. ‘Karley Skultety racked up 28 digs, followed by Jones (14), Bender (13) and Lehman (12). Ava Zeigler posted 31 assists.
“I thought Ava did an awesome job of distributing the ball and made great choices when to go to a 10-foot attack,” Frelin said. “She was on top of her game.
“I also thought we got a lot of hands on the ball at the net, not necessarily on blocks, but enough that we could swing at the ball. And this group seems to play pretty well when we’re out of system.”
The Blue Devils (7-1) got plenty of numbers from its usual sources: Abby Eagler (15 kills, 7 points, 11 digs), Kylie Kerns (6 points, 4 aces, 3 blocks, 16 digs and 17 assists), Wren Roberts (6 kills, 8 points, 8 digs) and Alaina Garling (7 kills, 7 points, 17 assists), while Kinzee Hudson contributed 8 points and 8 digs.
Goodwin said, “It was a good learning game for us. We were able to stick with them and stay positive, and most of the time we really needed to get a side out, we were able to get it.”
Frelin said, “We made a lot of good decisions throughout the match. It was a great team win, both by those on the court and those on the bench.”