’Cats fall in four to Roosevelt

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BROOKINGS – Sioux Falls Roosevelt rattled off nine consecutive points to close out the match and seal a 25-18, 15-25, 25-17, 26-24 victory over the Bobcats in a nonconference volleyball action Tuesday night at the BHS Auxiliary Gymnasium.

“You know, we got stuck in a rut and that’ll happen; volleyball is a game of momentum,” said BHS coach Jodi Melius. “Of course, looking back, you wish you had made some changes earlier and stopped the run sooner, but we just weren’t able to.”

The fourth set was tied at 15-all, before the Bobcats began to pull away.

Grace Eggebrecht and Kylie Tucker sandwiched kills around an Ashlyn Borah service ace to make it 19-15.

Eggebrecht’s kill put Brookings ahead 20-16. Later, she had three consecutive kills and Emma Hardin added an ace as the ‘Cats went ahead 24-17 and were on the verge of forcing a fifth set.

However, a ball-handling error stopped the run – leaving the score at 24-18 – and Tatum Kooima took over on the service line for the Rough Riders.

She never relinquished the serve as Roosevelt scored eight more points to secure the victory.

Leah Koltz had 13 kills and Bella Garcia added 11 for the Rough Riders (7-8).

Erin Denevan dished out 40 set assists. Kooima came up with 15 digs as she and Abbi Peichel both netted a pair of aces.

The Rough Riders used an 8-1 spurt in Set 1 to grab a 15-7 advantage, and then continued to pull away to take a 1-0 lead in the match.

In the second set, Brookings had an 11-2 run to move ahead 13-5.

The Bobcats later scored six points in a row to go ahead 19-7 en route to pulling even in the match.

Roosevelt jumped out to a 14-6 lead in Set 3 and Brookings never got closer than five points down the stretch.

“Set to set, the lack of consistency is something we need to continue to work on,” Melius added. “I thought one hitter who played well consistently tonight was Grace Eggebrecht. She had 16 kills, three errors; I thought she played a really consistent match, so that was definitely a bright spot.”

Michaela Jewett finished with 42 set assists and 18 digs. Megan Gilk collected 20 digs and Hardin 19.

Annika Johnson had eight kills. Kailee Bartels notched five blocks and Tucker three.

Brookings (1-5) plays at Brandon Valley on Thursday at 7 p.m.