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The Oak Mountain Eagles swept both legs of a tri-match at James Clemens after earning Anna Claire Harris the first wins of her Eagles coaching career at the Juanita Boddie. (For the Reporter/Dawn Harrison)

By ANDREW SIMONSON | Sports Editor

MADISON – The Oak Mountain Eagles got the first wins of the Anna Claire Harris era as they keep building toward the start of area play next week.

Oak Mountain won twice at the Juanita Boddie Tournament on Aug. 23 and 24 at Hoover’s Finley Center before going to James Clemens High School to beat the Jets and the Madison Academy Mustangs in a tri-match on Tuesday, Aug. 27.

The Eagles weren’t able to get a win in their first match of the season, a showdown with traditional powerhouse Bayside Academy on Thursday, Aug. 22 that has become a staple of their schedule, but they found the win column for the first time the next day.

The Eagles swept Sparkman with a 25-16 win in the first set and a 25-23 victory in the second set to claim Harris’ first win at Oak Mountain.

From there, they faced a couple of tough tests against Valor College Prep out of Tennessee and Auburn and lost in straight sets in both of those matches. However, a win over Southside-Gadsden got them right back on track.

Oak Mountain won the first set in extra points 28-26 before taking the second set 25-15, which sealed up third place in Pool 12 and a spot in the Silver Bracket.

There, they faced the Homewood Patriots coached by their former coach Grace Burgess. While the Eagles took the first set 25-18, they couldn’t pull out a win in extra points in the second set and lost that frame 26-14. The third set was a tight one as well, but Homewood won it 15-12 to advance.

Oak Mountain looked to rebound from that loss in its first tri-match of the season, and it came out strong against both Madison Academy and James Clemens.

The Eagles got off to a good start in their first match against the Mustangs and went on to win the set 25-18.

Now with the match in control thanks to a 1-0 lead in the match, Oak Mountain saw out the sweep, but it had to work for the second set win.

The Eagles held off Madison Academy as the set drew to an end to secure the 25-23 win and take the 2-0 victory in the match.

Oak Mountain closed out the evening with a matchup against the hosts, fellow Class 7A side James Clemens, and just like the match against the Mustangs, the Eagles started out strong.

In the end, Oak Mountain finished the set with a double-digit lead and took the first set 25-15 to go up in the match.

The Jets made the second set a closer affair, but the Eagles finished out the set the same way they had in the other three sets of the tri-match: on top.

Oak Mountain won the second set 25-19 to earn another sweep and get back to .500 on the season with a 4-4 record.

The Eagles will be back in action on Thursday, Aug. 29 when they travel to Vestavia Hills for a match against the Rebels at 6 p.m.

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