By John Rittenhouse
A season-long three-game winning streak came to an end for the Hills-Beaver Creek volleyball team when it dropped a three-game home match to Murray County Central Tuesday.
The streak reached three consecutive wins with a five-game victory over Fulda on the road Thursday.
H-BC, 9-11 overall, will end the regular season by competing at the Southwest State University Invitational Tournament in Marshall tomorrow and Saturday.
MCC 3, H-BC 0
The Patriots couldn't keep the momentum rolling when they hosted the Rebels Tuesday.
Plagued by receiving problems throughout the match, H-BC never clicked offensively while dropping 15-4, 15-12 and 15-12 decisions.
"Our serve receive was not good at all," said Patriot coach Nicole Fey. "We were not able to pass the ball well because of our receiving problems, so we never really got into our offense."
Jody Rentschler charted 14 digs for the Patriots. Erin Boeve led the way with 12 kills.
H-BC 3, Fulda 2
An impressive rally by the Patriots gave them a five-game road victory in Fulda Thursday.
After dropping the first two games of the match to the Raiders, H-BC responded by posting three straight wins to steal the match from Fulda.
According to Patriot coach Fey, the difference of winning and losing games in Fulda came down to the mental approach of her players.
"In the first two games we just didn't play very smart volleyball. In the last three games we started to read their defense and take what they were giving us. We played smarter volleyball in the last three games," she said.
After losing the first game 15-5, H-BC raced to an 11-2 lead in Game 2 before the Raiders went on a 13-0 run to prevail 15-11.
The Patriots trailed by three points early in the third game before snapping a tie at 11 with a 4-1 surge that capped a 15-11 win and ignited H-BC's comeback.
H-BC won Game 4 by a 15-8 margin before racing to a 10-0 lead that led to a 15-5 win in the finale.
Erin Boeve led the Patriots with 31 kills and 17 digs, while LaDonna Sandstede recorded 19 set assists. Tonya Leenderts completed all 35 of her serves and scored 26 points.