Crothersville’s Grace Smith battles with a West Washington player at the net on Monday night at home.
Dylan Wallace | The Tribune
Crothersville head coach Scott Sage talks to his team during a timeout on Monday against West Washington.
Dylan Wallace | The Tribune
Crothersville’s Hayden Pilgrim serves the ball against West Washington on Monday night.
Dylan Wallace | The Tribune
Crothersville’s Grace Smith sets the ball against West Washington on Monday night.
Dylan Wallace | The Tribune
Crothersville’s Pearl Shirley hits the ball over the net on Monday against West Washington.
Dylan Wallace | The Tribune
Crothersville’s Carlee Walker receives a serve on Monday against West Washington.
Dylan Wallace | The Tribune
CROTHERSVILLE — The Crothersville volleyball team battled point-for-point with West Washington on Monday night at home, but it was the Senators who left The Jungle happier with a 25-22, 25-16, 22-25, 25-23 victory.
Crothersville trailed 8-3 in the first set but stormed back to take a 9-8 lead. They then went down 14-10, but once again came back to lead 15-14. An ace by Carlee Walker gave the Tigers a 21-20 lead in the first set, but West Washington rallied to win five of the next six points.
“I was pretty happy with the first set as far as effort and attitude,” head coach Scott Sage said. “It’s just a couple points here and there. A lot of the points they got were just unforced errors on our part.”
Sage thought his team came out a little lackadaisical in the second set, which is why that was the biggest deficit on Monday night.
In the third set, Crothersville turned on the pressure. They were down 17-14, but then tied it up and took momentum from there, winning the set 25-22.
“We cleaned up our play a little bit and took that set,” Sage said. “I thought we fought pretty good in that fourth set. There were some more unforced errors, but that’s just more inexperience on our part.”
The Tigers play three freshmen consistently each match, and Sage thinks they’re coming along well.
Some of those is freshmen are Zoey Prince, who served 17-17 with two aces, and Hayden Pilgrim, who served 16-17 with two aces. Walker and Pearl Shirley had nice serving night as well, and as a team, the Tigers served 73-84 with 11 aces.
“I think it’s a big plus for us,” Sage said. “We can be aggressive there.”
Shirley led the team in hitting, going 18-25 with eight kills, and Elayna Ord went 15-15 with two kills. As a team, Crothersville went 79-95 with 12 kills. Walker also had 48 service receive balls hit her way.
Crothersville will keep searching for that elusive tonight when the Tigers play at Orleans.
“We’re learning the play together. We’re getting better, and I’m happy about that. You can learn as much from winning as you can from winning, and at some point, we’ll win a match.”