Lady Rams battle strong but fall 3-1 to Central Mountain

By Kenny Varner Jr.
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Updated: October 1, 2019

By Kenny Varner

SPRING MILLS – It was a hard fought battle from beginning to end as both the Central Mountain and Penns Valley Volleyball teams came out fired up and ready for action.

It would be a match where the biggest deficit in a game was five points.

However in the end, the Wildcats escaped with a 3-1 victory against the Rams Monday night.

Central Mountain won 25-23, 25-20 and 25-23. Their only loss was a 25-22 victory.

“I’ll tell you what there is not much separating us from them. We’ve been very fortunate to come out on the winning side against them both times,” said Central Mountain Coach Scott Garman. “If you look back at the team’s scores it’s always at least two points, three points at the most. It’s just a great battle. We got lucky tonight and it turned out in our favor.”

Penns Valley battled all evening, keeping pace with Central Mountain stride-for-stride. They were able to win the third game after falling 25-23 and 25-20.

With their backs against the wall, the Rams cane out firing.

Despite falling behind 0-4 early on four service points by Abby Brinker, Penns Valley came marching back and finally tying things at eight.

Picking up service points in the run was Hailey Coursen (2), Anna Butler (2) and Grace Bressler (1).

In the scoring run, Butler highlighted it with an ace.

The Rams were tough up front with Cameron Upcraft protecting the net.

She helped the Rams take a 12-10 with a clutch block on the second of four service points for teammate Kailen Winkleblech.

When the service points were over, Penns Valley led 14-0.

But back battled the Wildcats as they would eventually tie things at 13.

The Rams trailed 14-13 but refused to let this game go away as muscled their was back to take 16-14 advantage.

But again, the Wildcats forced yet another tie as Kyleigh McDermitt showed her dominance in the front row as well.

As the game got down to the end, the Rams shrugged off numerous Wildcat comeback attacks to take the victory 25-22.

“We came up a little short. They battled. They came up short,” said Penns Valley Coach Jayme Ishler. “ You some and you lose some and we come back tomorrow night.”

In the fourth game, the Rams and Wildcats forced a long post season like battle starting from the beginning.

Penns Valley led things off with two service points from Coursen, taking an early 2-0 advantage.

After a side out by both teams, the Rams had a 3-1 lead. Penns Valley would build up a 5-3 lead before Central Mountain came back to tie.

With Loni Duck on the service line, Central Mountain picked up two key points from a blast by McKenzie Hanna and a soft tap down by Evie Rembold, putting them dead even with Penns Valley.

Later on, with game tied at seven, Central Mountain reeled off six consecutive service points to give the Wildcats as 12-7 advantage.

But the Rams refused to go down without a fight as they were able to slowly battle back to tie things at 15.

The game would be one of dramatic momentum shifts.

Again both teams found themselves tied at 20 and then 23.

But the Wildcats got hot when it needed to, posting the last two points of the game.

The service points and the win were secured by Hanna.

In the first game, the two immediately went at it head to head. From beginning to end, the two teams battled right down to the wire, with Central Mountain eking out a slim 25-23 victory.

The theme remained the same in the second contest when the two clashed.

Dive after dive, dig after dig, both teams were letting everything they had on the court and it showed in the second game as well when the Wildcats escaped that game 25-20 winners.

Penns Valley is back in action today as it travels to Huntingdon while Central Mountain hosts Shamokin on Wednesday.

Central Mountain 3, Penns Valley 1

CM 25 25 22 25

PV 23 20 25 23