ELLISVILLE, Miss. — Despite a strong start, the Pearl River volleyball team couldn't maintain momentum against No. 25 Jones College, falling in straight sets, 3-0 (22-25, 20-25, 19-25) in Monday night's matchup.
"I thought we served really well and were able to keep them out of sorts offensively," head coach Haley Chatham said. "Their high scorers didn't get a ton of big swings, and typically, when we're able to keep teams off-speed and out of system, our offense takes off and scores a lot of points.
"It didn't happen tonight because we let them beat us in the small game. We struggled turning easy balls into points. It's hard to win when that happens."
Pearl River (22-10 overall; 10-4 MACCC) opened strong against Jones College (25-4; 14-1), jumping out to a quick lead in the first set. The Wildcats used four service aces — three from Morgan Mears (Hurley; East Central) and one from Kinsley Jean Stegall (Saucier; Our Lady Academy) — to storm ahead 12-2.
Pearl River maintained control for much of the set, with Reagan Ziegler (Lacombe, La.; Lakeshore), Avery Wheat (Gonzales, La.; East Ascension) and Lila Willett (Chelsea, Ala.) contributing key points to push the lead to 16-12. Jones didn't back down, though. The Bobcats rallied late to tie the set at 22-22, then closed it out with three straight points to take a 25-22 win.
In set two, Pearl River fell behind early, 9-5, before battling back to tie it at 12-12. The rally was sparked by two kills from Wheat, a Jones service error, a kill from Willett and a service ace by Jordyn Wilks (Independence, La.; Hammond Magnet).
Despite tying it up, the Wildcats found themselves trailing again, 21-14. Wheat delivered another key kill to cut the deficit to 22-18, and a well-placed backset from Claire Smith (Coldwater; Lewisburg) set up another Wheat kill to make it 23-20. The Bobcats fended off the surge and closed out the set, 25-20.
Set three followed a similar pattern, with the Wildcats falling behind 9-5 early. Refusing to back down, Pearl River stayed in it with back-to-back aces from Wheat. Down 23-15, a kill from Wheat off another Smith assist sparked a late 4-1 run, narrowing the gap to 24-19. However, Jones held on to win the set, 25-19, and completed the sweep.
NEXT UP
Pearl River will come back home Wednesday to compete against rival Gulf Coast at 6 p.m.
TICKETS
Tickets for the 2025 Pearl River volleyball season are available now at PRCCAthletics.com/Tickets. Advance-purchase tickets are $8, while gameday tickets are $10.
TUNE IN
All home Pearl River Volleyball games are livestreamed for free at PRCCMedia.com/gold. Fans who have Roku, Amazon Fire or Apple TV devices can also watch the Wildcat broadcasts by downloading the "Pearl River CC" channel from their app stores.
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