Marshall County and Christian Fellowship are located within the same half mile on Highway 68 and played for the 64th time on Monday. Since 2002, Christian Fellowship holds a slight edge in the overall series 33-31 but the Lady Marshals added another win to their column after beating the Lady Eagles at home 3-0 (25-17, 25-19, 25-20).
Each team has had lengthy runs, CFS winning the first 12 and Marshall County with a run of 10 straight between 2007 and 2010. In the last decade, neither team has put together a win-streak over four straight.
The last meeting between the two district rivals was last season’s 4th District Championship that went five sets and ended in a 3-2 win for the Lady Marshals. With Monday’s win the Lady Marshals improve to 2-3 and Christian Fellowship is 1-1.
“We’re very excited”, first-year Head Coach Paige Perego said about the district win. “These girls have been working very, very hard.”
Christian Fellowship Head Coach Suzie Burnett begins her 14th season and over that time has led the Lady Eagles to a record of 253-151.
Trailing 0-2 to start the first set, the Lady Marshals took a 3-2 lead behind the serves of Ayla Holt. A couple of ties and lead changes later, a kill by Marshall County’s Sarah Bremmerkamp gave them a four-point lead at 13-9. Bremmerkamp, with a couple more impressive kills in the set, helped fuel the Lady Marshals 25-17 first set win.
Lead changes and ties made up the majority of the second set as each team struggled a bit from the service line. A kill by Bremmerkamp was followed soon after by two straight from teammate Abby Belcher to put the Lady Marshals up 21-17 on their way to a 25-19 second set win.
The Lady Marshals took an early 4-1 lead in the third set before the Lady Eagles tied it up at 8-8, the first of four ties until senior Gracie Howard’s kill gave CFS a 14-12 lead. The set was tied up again on a kill by Bremmerkamp and the Lady Marshals took the lead on a Holt service ace. They went on to finish out the 25-20 third set win on a final kill by Bremmerkamp.
“We have only three returning varsity girls from last year, so we’re very very young”, Perego said. “We’re just working together and it’s showing more and more as we play.”
Bremmerkamp finished with 16 kills and Belcher had eight for the Lady Marshals. Holt served up seven aces, Belcher and Kylie Merrick had three aces each.
The win completed a sweep over CFS with the freshman and JV teams both winning 2-0.
The Lady Marshals will play at Carlisle County on Thursday, the Lady Eagles play at Community Christian Academy tonight.
