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The Shelby County Wildcats are off to a flying start in area play after fighting for a pair of area wins over St. Clair County to sweep the regular season series. (Reporter Photos/Andrew Simonson)

By ANDREW SIMONSON | Sports Editor

The Shelby County Wildcats started out area play strong with two wins over the Central-Clay County Volunteers in less than a week.

Shelby County defeated Central-Clay 3-1 on the road on Thursday, Sept. 12, rallying from a loss in the second set to claim the third and fourth sets for the victory.

“Even though we made a lot of mistakes in the first two sets, we kept our energy level high and finished strong,” Shelby County head coach Stacy McGehee said.

The Wildcats then took the momentum from that win and swept the Volunteers 3-0 on Monday, Sept. 16 at Shelby County High School.

Shelby County started out the first match on the back foot, but they fought back to tie up the first set at 14-14.

From there, Kristina Horton’s service game led the way as the Wildcats took the set 25-21.

While Shelby County overcame their miscues in the first set, they couldn’t do the same in the second set.

Errors allowed Central-Clay to get in front and stay there before they took the set 25-18.

That tied up the match at one set win apiece with everything hanging in the balance.

The Wildcats stepped up and came out strong in the third set to take control. Horton and Wendy McGehee took control on the serve before Allison Binkerd put away points to build on the lead.

Shelby County used those efforts to claim the third set 25-21, and that swung the momentum back in their favor.

The Volunteers fought back to make the fourth set tight to begin with, but the Wildcats proved to be too strong down the stretch.

In the end, Shelby County pulled away for the 25-16 win in the fourth set to start out area play with a victory.

Binkerd led the Wildcats with 13 kills. McGehee had 12 assists, two aces and four digs, Catelynn Davis earned a team-high 18 digs and Horton secured four aces, three kills and three digs.

Shelby County then came home on Monday, Sept. 16 for the second leg of their area series against Central-Clay, and the Wildcats had to fight for the win from the early moments of the match.

The two area foes were deadlocked down the stretch, and a 24-24 tie turned into a back-and-forth stretch.

Shelby County ended up getting the last say with back-to-back points to take the first set 29-27.

The tight nature of the match continued into the second set when the Volunteers took control of the lead but faced continued pushback from the Wildcats.

The set once again required extra points to decide a winner, and after trading blows, Shelby County broke through and claimed another 29-27 win.

Stacy was encouraged by the way his team faced adversity in the opening two sets to take a commanding 2-0 lead in the match.

“We kept our composure when Clay made the run in the first set and then were really proud of the way we fought back from behind to win the second set,” Stacy said.

From there, the Wildcats got out in front in the third set and never looked back, pulling away for a 25-15 victory.

That set win sealed the sweep of both the match and the regular season series against Central-Clay.

Stacy was proud of the way Shelby County put everything together to turn in a complete performance in the third set and take the win.

“Our coaching staff has been challenging our girls to become more consistent with energy and play and I think we did that in the third set,” Stacy said.

Connell and Laney Byars tied for the team-high in kills with eight, and Connell added an ace and a dig and Byars secured two total blocks as well.

Wendy earned 10 assists, an ace and a dig, Davis had a team-high 10 digs and Peyton Cannady took four kills.

Those performances came with a shorthanded roster, and Stacy appreciated how his players filled those voids to still earn the win.

“I was proud of the way we played last night,” Stacy said. “We were missing two starters due to sickness and our team really stepped up to the challenge.”

The Wildcats will resume area play on the road at the Briarwood Christian Lions on Thursday, Sept. 19 at 6 p.m.

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