Owls Battle Eagles to the End

Citrus College dropped a five-set loss (25-22, 22-25, 25-18, 7-25, 15-12) to Mt. San Jacinto Friday evening but didn't go down without a fight.

The Owls slip to 3-12 overall, while the Eagles improve to 11-4 on the year.

Two Owls finished the night with double-digit kills, led by McKenna Cooper with 11 kills. Faith Evaro followed with 10 kills, while Desiree Reyes and Julia Pitre were right on the cusp with nine kills each. Vanessa Marquez finished with 25 assists, while Raegen Johnson added 10 assists.

Defensively, Evaro had a match-high 16 digs for a double-double, followed by 10 digs from Cooper and nine digs from Mychaela Ortiz. Tara Biscan posted six blocks in the match to help the Owls out-block the Eagles 10-4.

After finding themselves trailing 2-1 in the match, the Owls came out determined to force a deciding set in the fourth and were firing on all cylinders. Citrus had 11 kills on 18 attempts in the set, committing just one error to boast a .556 attack percentage while also holding the Eagles to a -.294 clip.

It forced a fifth and deciding set with momentum in the Owls' favor.

The two teams exchanged points to start the set before back-to-back errors from Mt. San Jacinto put the Owls up by three, 6-3. Things took a turn, however, as the Eagles scored eight unanswered points to take control of the set.

Coming out of a timeout, Citrus battled back within a point, 12-11, off a kill from Pitre and a combination block from Evaro and Biscan to force an Eagle timeout.

Mt. San Jacinto regained its composure and closed out the set on a 4-1 run to secure the match victory.

The Owls turn their attention to Western State Conference action next week as they host Bakersfield College on Wednesday at 6 p.m.