RAPID CITY — After going five tough sets the previous night against R.C. Stevens, the Huron Tigers had to make a quick recovery to take on the R.C. Central Cobblers Saturday afternoon.
Mission accomplished.
The Tigers came out quickly and after struggles in sets two and three, dispatched the Cobblers in straight sets, 25-12, 25-23 and 25-19.
Huron improves to 10-8 with the win, while RCC falls to 6-16 with the loss.
“The girls knew this weekend was important,” said Tiger coach Shelly Buddenhagen. “We are a tired volleyball team after the five-setter last night and then an early game today, but it’s a good tired because we really put forth a lot of effort this weekend. It will be a nice ride home today.”
The Tigers jumped out early in the first set, as Kayla Schimke and Hollee Niehus contributed kills and Havyn Heinz collected an ace to stake Huron to a quick 6-1 lead.
The Cobblers battled back, cutting the lead to two points, at 8-6 before Huron went on a 10-0 run to put the match out of reach, as the Tigers cruised to the 25-12 win.
The second game took a different course, as the two teams traded points and the lead throughout the first half of the game, until Central went up 13-11. They pushed the lead to five points, at 18-13 before Huron began its comeback.
A Jayda Shillingstad kill cut the margin to four, at 23-19 and ignited a rally. Niehus had a pair of kills, Shillingstad had an ace and Schimke closed the match with a kill down the middle for the come-from-behind 25-23 win, as the Tigers closed on a 7-0 run.
The Cobblers seemed intent upon not even letting Huron keep the score close in the third set, as seniors Sam Sejeskog and Erin Trohkimoinen pushed Central to an early 7-1 advantage.

The Tigers began to chip away at the lead, getting a couple of kills from Niehus and a raft of Cobbler miscues to get close, then knotting the score at 13, on back-to-back Schimke kills.
Rapid City battled back, as Sejeskog and Ali Weber scored kills to counter a pair of Niehus gems and make it 18-18.
But from there, it was all Tigers, as Tracy Albrecht collected an ace, Niehus had a kill and an ace and Mikena More added a kill to put Huron at match point.
Fittingly, a Rapid City hitting error gave Huron the sweep in the game.
“We dug ourselves a pretty good hole in both the second and third sets,” Buddenhagen noted, “but we gutted it out. We had some girls step in to relieve some of the starters and we need that today. I am just so proud of the kids and the effort that they put forward this weekend.”
Niehus ended with 12 kills a a pair of aces to pace the Huron attack. Schimke had five aces and Albrecht ended with four, while Shillingstad had 20 set assists. Heinz had a pair of aces and led the defensive effort with 30 kills. In total, three other Tigers also collected double-figure kills on the night.

Friday night
Rapid City Stevens 3, Huron 2
RAPID CITY — If there is such a thing as a good loss, it may have taken place Friday night at R.C. Stevens High School.
The top-rated and probable top-seeded Stevens Raiders defeated the Huron Tigers 25-19, 25-22, 26-28, 23-25 and 15-9. Stevens moves to 24-3 with the win, while Huron falls to 9-8 with the loss.
“I’m extremely happy with the way we battled tonight,” said Tiger coach Shelly Buddenhagen. “We felt we got some bad breaks, but we battled through, put some pressure on them and played one point at a time.”
Hollee Niehus led the Tiger offense with 23 kills, while Kayla Schimke added 13 in the game and Tracy Albrecht notched six in her first start of the season. Jayda Shillingstad handed out 41 set assists in the game. Havyn Heinz led the defense with 39 digs.
Buddenhagen said she was happy with the way her team served and how they kept the taller Raiders off balance.
“We keep saying that the serve is our first line of defense and that was true tonight,” she said. “We got them out of system often tonight.”
Budddenhagen noted that the Stevens twin outside hitters Kyah Watson and Elizabeth Schaefer each notched only 15 kills.
“They may be the best tandem of outside hitters that we have faced this year and we did a good job of limiting their good swings tonight. They are normally around the .250 mark, or where they convert on about one quarter of their attempts and we held them below 20 percent tonight. That is from a good team effort.”
Buddenhagen said that she felt it was one of the best matches that the Tigers have played this season. “We kind of think of this as one of those ‘silver linings’ victories,” she added.
Huron won all three of the preliminary matches Friday night, winning the Freshman match 25-13, 25-23; taking the Sophomore match 26-24 and 25-20 and tallying a 25-19, 25-11 win in the JV match.