YANKTON — The Huron Tiger volleyball team saw its season record drop to 6-2 Tuesday night, after dropping a 3-1 decision to the Yankton Gazelles, at the Summit Center. Yankton improves to 2-7 with the dominant win that saw the Gazelles post set scores of 25-22, 18-25, 25-19 and 25-17.

“Yankton came out and took our confidence and ran with it,” said Huron coach TyAnn Ulmer. “They played with confidence tonight and we didn’t.”

Huron had a rough start to the match, quickly falling behind 6-2, before Aly Davis and Makenzie Siemonsma ignited a rally where both collected two kills, as Huron forged a 6-6 tie. The set remained close, but Yankton ran four straight points to take a 12-8 lead, maintaining that lead until a Davis kill and a net violation on Yankton brought Huron to within one, at 19-18.

Macy Drotzmann, however, got a kill and Camille McDermott added another to push the lead to three. Hamtyn Heinz and DaJai Claggett went back-to-back to counter for the Tigers and another net violation knotted the score at 21-all.

But the rally ended there for Huron as Yankton finished the set on a 4-1 run and McDermott closed the 25-22 win with an ace serve.

As sluggish as the Tigers were in the first set, they came out on fire to begin the second. A Claggett kill, a pair of Gazelle errors and three straight aces by Heinz put Huron out to a quick 6-0 lead. A Yankton timeout didn’t stem the Huron tide, as Claggett scored again and Aurora Dreyer hit a bit left-handed kill to put Huron up 12-2.

Huron controlled the lead throughout the set, as Davis, Siemonsma and Heinz continually found open spots in the Gazelle defense. Yankton got within four points late, at 21-17, but Siemonsma had a big swing and Claggett went back-to-back to close out the 25-18 set win for the Tigers.

The third set was Yankton’s. The Gazelles won the set 25-19, but along the way Huron managed only five offensive points - three from Heinz, and one each from Claggett and Sam Mangmoradeth. The remainder of Huron’s points were Gazelle gifts.

When Yankton managed to keep the ball within the lines, Macy Drotzmann caused all kinds of problems for the Huron defense, as the 5-foot, 11-inch senior notched eight kills for the Gazelles, as they went ahead two sets to one.

Huron fell behind in the fourth set 8-3, as Camryn Koletzky had two kills, Ava Koller added one and McDermott got an ace to jump out quickly.

The lead swelled as high as 13 points for Yankton, before a 5-0 Huron run, capped by a Dreyer kill, made it 22-14. Huron got to within six points late, as Hylton Heinz laced an ace, but the deficit was too large for the Tigers and Yankton took the deciding set 25-17.

Davis led the Tigers with 10 kills and Siemonsma added eight. Claggett had seven kills, while Hamtyn Heinz had six kills and three aces in the match.

Drotzman had a career night at the net for the Gazelles, ending the match with 21 kills, while Koletzky also dented double figures with 11 and Koller had eight. McDermott had six kill and three aces and kept the Tiger defense off balance all night with her setting.

“After the match we had a talk about how we need 100 percent effort from each and every person to be successful,” Ulmer said. “We challenged them. What do they want? Hopefully tonight lit a competitive fire in them, because all we have is our ability to compete.”

Huron will need to regroup quickly, as top-ranked Harrisburg visits Huron Arena Thursday night.

Yankton made a sweep of the night, as the Gazelle sophomore team won 10-25, 25-19 and 15-12, while  the JV team won in two sets, 25-13, 26-24.