COLUMBUS, Neb. – Fresh off of a pair of Friday afternoon wins to open their season, the Cloud County Community College volleyball team would carry over early season momentum into their first match of the day to earn a 3-0 sweep of Southwestern Iowa Community College before dropping their second match of the day in four sets to host Central Community College to split a pair of matches inside the Raider Field House in Columbus, Nebraska on Saturday, August 19th.
 
Picking up their third win of the year with a sweep before suffering their first loss of the year, CCCC is now 3-1 overall with Southwestern Iowa CC dropping both of their matches in the triangular while seeing host Central pick up two wins.
 
Against Southwestern Iowa CC:
Getting to face a Spartan squad that had already played one match with a three-set defeat to Central to open the triangular, Cloud County would take full advantage of having the fresher legs to earn a 25-20, 25-10, and 25-14 sweep. Defense would be able to help carry the load in the match as 12 blocks by the T-Birds would see three different T-Birds record solo blocks as five different players would record at least one block while also outscoring SWICC 10-4 at the service line. Despite being held to just a .113 attack percentage in the match, Cloud County would hold the Spartans to a -.060 attack percentage as no player for Southwestern Iowa would record more than five kills in the match.
 
Individually, CCCC would be led by a match-high nine kills from sophomore Doga Eski who would also have nine digs and two assisted blocks. Following up a 20-kill afternoon across Cloud County's two matches on Friday, Bradie Medina would record another seven kills and seven digs along with one block while Madison Ronnebaum would provide eight kills offensively. Dishing out 25 set assists would be Katelynn Brogan to go along with four digs and two assisted blocks as 31 of 32 T-Bird kills would have a set assist.
 
Against Central CC:
Allowing the host Raiders to score the first three points of the match, Cloud County would be forced to dig out of an early hole with a 4-0 run that would be capped off by an Ashley Suter service ace to give CCCC their first lead of the opening set. The T-Birds would be able to extend their lead to 8-6 before seeing Central use a service ace at 9-7 to pull back within a point before another 4-0 CCCC run with Medina serving. The Raiders would respond with their own 4-0 run before the T-Birds would string together three straight points to go up 17-13 and force a Central timeout. The run would extend out of the timeout to give the T-Birds a set-high six-point lead at 19-13 before seeing Central get back into the set with three straight points. After slowing the Raider rally momentarily, Cloud County would find Central once again getting on a roll to tie things at 21-21 and eventually take the set by scoring nine of the final 10 points to earn a 25-21 set win.
 
Scoring four of the first five points of set two, Cloud County would try to put the first set rally by Central behind them by jumping out to a 6-1 lead before seeing the Raiders pull back within two at 9-7 with a 6-3 run. Using a block to regain serve, the T-Birds would get a service ace from Suter to go up 11-7 and maintain some breathing room as the lead would hover between two and six points for most of the next 10 points. Forcing a Raider timeout at 17-11, CCCC would get a break with Central committing a service error after back-to-back points that brought the score back within four with the rest of the set never getting any closer with Cloud County pulling away for a 25-18 set victory to tie the match at 1-1.
 
Facing another early deficit after allowing Central to score four of the first five points of the third set, Cloud County would manage to rally and pull things even at 6-6 before taking a 7-6 lead. Ties at 7-7 and 8-8 would be followed by a 3-0 CCCC run to go up 11-8 before three straight Central blocks as part of a 4-0 Raider run would give Central the lead at 12-11. Two more ties would be seen at 12-12 and 13-13 before a 4-1 Raider run to put Central up 17-14 and eventually push things out to 20-15. Working through things to try and flip momentum back, Cloud County would chip away at the Raider lead to pull within one on an Eski Kill to make things 21-20 in favor of Central before seeing a 3-1 surge by the Raiders put things at set point. Using a timeout to try and make a run of their own, the T-Birds would manage to extend the set for one more point before seeing Central score the set-ending point to win 25-22.
 
Taking advantage of some opportunities to take a 5-2 lead in the opening stages of a must-win fourth set, Cloud County would not trail throughout the opening 15 points of the set to take a 10-5 lead and force an early Central timeout with momentum trending in favor of the T-Birds. Five of the next six points out of the timeout would be scored by Central to bring things back within a point at 11-10 before seeing the score eventually get knotted up at 12-12 with the Raiders pulling ahead for the first time at 13-12. With the score tied at 14-14, Central would put together a 3-0 run to force a CCCC timeout with things starting to get away from the T-Birds as Cloud County would struggle to find a way to pull things back even. Facing a 19-18 deficit with the set still very much up for grabs, Cloud County would see Central four of the next five points to begin to pull away as the T-Birds would use their final timeout to ultimately delay the inevitable of dropping the set by a score of 25-20 to end the match.
 
10 blocks by Central to go along with 10 service aces would be an issue for CCCC throughout the match as the T-Birds would only manage to six service aces of their own and six blocks on the defensive end. Hitting just .150 as a team, 23 attack errors would also be an issue for Cloud County with only two players recording an individual attack percentage above .200. Notching a match-high 15 kills would be Eski who also had eight digs and two blocks including one solo block. Ronnebaum would reach double-figure kills for the first time of the season while seeing Jacey Schurle have eight kills on 13 attempts for a .538 attack percentage. Leading CCCC in set assists for the second-straight match with 25 would be Brogan while also providing 22 digs with Madelynn Wells serving as the team lead in digs with a match-high 27.
 
What's Next?
Cloud County will begin a six-match week with the 2023 home opener on Monday, August 21st when the T-Birds play host to the Bethany College JV team at 6:30 PM. The match will be the first of consecutive home matches next week with CCCC also taking on the McPherson College JV team at home on Tuesday evening.