Alpena volleyball team falls in four sets to Petoskey at home
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ALPENA -- The Alpena High volleyball team again fell short in another Big North Conference game on Wednesday.
The Wildcats ended up stealing one set from Petoskey, but the Northmen pulled through, winning three out of the four sets. Alpena lost the first two sets by scores of 13-25 and 16-25. In the third set, the Wildcats ended up taking in a thrilling 26-24 victory but collapsed in the final match 13-25.
"There's definitely some things to clean up and work on. Most of our mistakes are self-induced, and staying consistent as a team is huge for us," Alpena coach Kolby Andrews said. "We know we can hang with anyone in the conference; we just need to play our best game for all three sets."
One issue the Wildcats have faced all season long is going down early in a set and never being able to recover.
This occurred again on Wednesday when Alpena fell into a 4-1 hole and then proceeded to stick with the Northmen for most of the match. Petoskey truly pulled away after going up 22-9, finishing the final three points with a 25-13 win.
The second set saw a much different start, where the Wildcats took an early 3-0 lead. Immediately following the great start, a couple of kills completely shifted the momentum towards the Northmen.
Petoskey slowly increased its lead until the score was 20-11, and Alpena stood no chance of returning. Alpena took a few points until they succumbed to a 16-25 loss.
Peotskey's key to success in the first two sets was its ability to block almost all of Alpena's shots and return with a perfect kill that the Wildcats couldn't return.
In the third set, Alpena began to hit over the Northmen's blocks, leading to lots of success.
Just like the second set, Alpean took an early 3-0 lead, which got away from the Wildcats after Petoskey began to find a rhythm.
The difference between this set was that the Wildcats held their own throughout the set. Alpena tied Petoskey at 19-19, and both sides returned points until the score was knotted at 24-24.
A pair of Petoskey mistakes that Alpena capitalized on led to the Wildcats taking two straight points and the victory.
"We changed a couple of things in our rotation and lineup, which helped us stay in it. Honestly, I think the girls just really decided to play our game, and that really helped us play comfortably and confidently," Andrews said.
Despite the accomplishments made in the third set, the fourth fell apart for the Wildcats. Struggles when trying to get kills for Alpena led to a very stagnant offensive game. Petoskey took full advantage of this by taking a 13-25 victory, sending the Wildcats to the locker room with much to improve before taking on Traverse City Central next Tuesday.
Leading the Wildcats in kills on Wednesday was Sydney Hitzelberger with eight, and Madelynn Cameron finished with seven. Alpena's leader in digs was Laurel Alberts, who finished with 23, while Olivia Precord had 10.
Avery Dubey led the Wildcats in assists with 20.