Box Score MERIDIAN – It wasn't easy, but the Northwest Mississippi Community College volleyball team (27-4, 11-2) picked up a four-set win over Meridian Community College (10-20, 1-13) on Wednesday night to move within one win of tying the all-time record for Ranger volleyball wins in a season.
"It was a tough win against a super scrappy team tonight. I'm proud we battled through," Head Coach Allison Burchyett said.
The match opened with a tightly contested first set that gave a sign of things to come as both teams traded opening salvos on the way to ties at 9, 10, 11, 12, and 13 before the Rangers pulled away with a three-point run to gain some separation at 16-13.
Meridian fell behind by as much as four but made things interesting with a run of their own to tie the set again at 20, 21, 22, and 23 but ran out of steam as kills from Ariana Woods and Reese McIntosh closed the opening set with a 25-23 win going the way of Northwest.
Northwest kept that momentum going into the second set where they slowly built up a lead with small two-point runs to go up 13-8 and again pushing ahead at 15-11 until they blew the Eagles away with a 10-3 run to close out the set, picking up seven kills and an ace in the rally to go up 2-0 thanks to a 25-15 win.
The third set was a bit of a different story.
Meridian began to find their confidence as the set opened with a 5-2 run for the home team and after the Rangers seemed to regain balance and it went to a back-and-forth match with eight ties on the way to 16-all score.
The Eagles found the break point that stuck though, going on a 3-0 run on a pair of kills and a block and held off the charging Northwest side that could only close the gap to one twice before falling 25-21 as the match went to a fourth set.
It seemed like Meridian had found their groove and Northwest fell behind early and trailed by as much as five, going down 16-11 before taking back control of the set and the match.
The sides found themselves at the same differential with the Rangers down 22-17 when they rolled off a 7-0 run to take a 24-22 edge. It went to extra points after the Eagles kept alive with back-to-back points on a kill and a block and the two sides found it tied again at 25-all but Northwest picked up the win on back-to-back kills from Aven Mathis to earn the 27-25 win and take the match in four sets.
Callahan led the way for the Rangers with eleven kills in the match and was followed closely by a ten kill night from Mathis. they also saw nine from Chloe Fesperman and eight from Woods.
Dallas White had 20 assists and Chloe Rodriguez had 13 while eight Rangers recorded an assist in the game.
The team played strong defense as well at the net with four blocks from Woods and three from Ava Robbins and as a team the Rangers picked up eight total blocks. They also served well with seven aces in the match led by three from Hassie Clare Thurman.
It pushes the teams winning streak to seven consecutive matches as they head into the final three matches of the regular season, with postseason play scheduled to begin on October 29th.
Two of their final three matches are at home, with a face off against Itawamba Community College on Monday, the 20th at 6:00 pm before closing the year against Northeast Mississippi Community College on the 27th for sophomore night.
More information on the Northwest volleyball team can be found at nwccrangers.com or by following along on Ranger social media accounts.
