CENTERVILLE — The Beavercreek Beavers girls high school volleyball team played its final regular season game in a Greater Western Ohio Conference National East matchup against the Centerville Elks, Oct. 12.
The two teams regularly were within just a few scores of each other the entire night. However, Beavercreek faltered in the fourth set and lost the match 3-1 by scores of 25-22, 25-19, 24-26, and 25-14.
“We played well most of the night, but had a crappy last set and made too many mistakes,” Beavercreek coach Tim Green said. “Against good teams like Centerville, we need to convert on our opportunities.”
The first set was back and forth the whole way. The teams regularly matched each other’s points all the way up to the Elks’ final run. Centerville just pulled the set out at the end to get the early advantage.
“We had some great digs in the first set, but we just couldn’t convert them,” Green said. “That first set really kind of slipped away when we had a good opportunity to take it.”
Centerville also took the second set, which set up a do-or-die situation for the Beavers in the third. The set was close the whole way, similar to the first, and the Beavers pulled out the win this time.
“We scrapped really well and played really good defense,” Green said.
The Beavercreek defense was strong throughout as the team came up with 54 digs, led by Kelly Goenaga-Lask who had 16 of them.
However, in the fourth set Centerville started out with a scorching 10-3 run and rode that momentum to win the set 25-14 which won them the match.
Senior Sarah Laughman led the Beavers with 13 kills.
With the regular season concluded, the Beavers will look towards the postseason. They have a first-round bye and will play the winner of the Lebanon-Xenia game. The Beavers will next play on Saturday, Oct 21 at Centerville High School.
“We get a week off now and a week to prepare, so we will be getting ready for those teams,” Green said. “It was good to get to play here and get used to the gym that we are going to have in sectionals.”
