ABERDEEN — The Huron Tigers were unable to get their offense running Tuesday night, dropping a 3-0, straight set Eastern South Dakota Conference volleyball match to the Aberdeen Central Golden Eagles. Set scores for AC were 25-19, 25-17, 25-19. The Golden Eagles improve to 6-3 with the win. Huron falls to 4-6.

“We didn’t come to play; didn’t bring our game off the bus with us,” said Huron coach Josh Lien at the close of the match. “Our service game was off, we never got into our offense and we didn’t put any pressure on Aberdeen tonight.”

The first set really set the tone for the evening’s play, as sophomore Lauryn Burckhard had a kill and followed it with an ace serve that ignited a 5-0 Golden Eagle run, staking the home team to a 10-4 lead.

Huron hung around - setter Jencie Goergen had two kills, but Aberdeen held a four point lead at 13-9 at the midway point of the first set. The score had more to do with Golden Eagle miscues, as opposed to Huron offensive success, however.

The lead remained about the same, as kills by Aly Davis and Addy Knight kept the Tigers in the hunt, but down the stretch it was too much Burckhard, with assistance from Kenadi Withers as the Golden Eagles powered to the first set win.

The second set was identical in the early going, as Burckhard and Kamdyn Borge staked AC to a 8-4 lead.

Huron fought back, with a kill from Goergen and a pair of points from Davis, but gave back points from the service line.

“When we played these guys a couple weeks ago we had a very aggressive service game and it kind of kept them off balance,” Lien noted.

“Tonight, we had a rough night serving the ball and we never dictated anything. Their setter could simply decide which big swinger to get it to and they were successful.”

Kills by Withers, Borge and Karlie Nieman pushed the lead to eight points at mid-set and while a Knight kill cut the margin to five points late, too much Burckhard and Withers capped the 25-17 win for Aberdeen.

Looking to shake things up, and also get some bench players experience, Lien opened the third set with a revamped lineup.

Aberdeen responded with an 11-1 run to open the set. The starters subbed in for the Tigers and began to play a more aggressive style of volleyball.

Goergen, Knight and Samantha Mangmoradeth got kills on consecutive rallies and the Tigers cut the lead to six after another Knight kill and a Goergen ace serve.

A kill from Aurora Dreyer and a block-kill by Davis cut the lead to five points, at 15-10 and capped a 9-4 run for the Tigers.

But Withers got a kills, Burckhard added two in succession and Aberdeen right the ship and said away for the 25-19 clincher.

Burckhard had 14 kills and an ace to lead the Aberdeen, which also got 11 kills form Withers and 10 from Borge. Setter Alivia Miller had four kills and a pair of aces for the Golden Eagles.

For Huron, Davis and Knight led the score sheet with eight kills each.

Dreyer added four kills and Goergen had five kills and a pair of aces from her setter position.

“There were lots of little things that snowballed tonight,” Lien said.
“We would get out of position on defense, or have a bad serve receive or just make a bad pass and suddenly they have run five or six points. We have to be aware and not let a couple little mistakes multiply into something we can’t overcome.”

Huron has one day to get things rectified, as Brookings comes to Huron Arena Thursday night for another ESD tussle.

“Brookings has good outside hitters and they bring a lot of the same issues that we had tonight with Aberdeen,” Lien said.

“We have to figure some things out.”

Aberdeen made the sweep on the evening, taking the JV, Sophomore and both freshman matches in straight sets in the lower level action.

Score by sets
Huron 19 17 19
Aberdeen 25 25 25