The California Lady Pintos improved their record to 11-7-1 Tuesday night with a straight set win against Versailles (25-16, 25-19). California has now won seven in a row in non-tournament games after starting the season 1-4.
"The first part of the season, we were playing teams that made it to the final four last year," California head coach Julie Bailey said. "We were playing some pretty tough competition. I think Adrienne (Strickfaden) getting well is helping, and the rest of the girls are finally playing to their potential."
Versailles started with an early 4-1 lead in the first, but then the Lady Pintos went on the first of two long runs to grab control of the set. Cameron Meyer recorded back-to-back kills and Adienne Strickfaden had two aces during a 7-0 run to take the 8-4 lead.
As a team, California had 11 aces in the contest.
"(Monday) night, we had five serving errors in the second set," Bailey said. "That was something we focused on, we have to cut out our errors. We can't have those kind of errors against a team like this and come out with the win. They stepped up and knew that's what they needed to do."
The Lady Tigers tied the game twice then took a 14-13 lead before California scored 11-straight points to push its lead to 24-14. Strickfaden had two blocks during the stretch.
California allowed Versailles to get two more points before closing out the set 25-16.
"As I watch her play and progress, you can maybe tell she's starting to get over her injury some and that the pain is not as severe," Bailey said. "Her goal this season has been to block and tonight, it showed."
In a 20-kill attack, Strickfaden and Meyer led the team with seven kills each. Strickfaden also had the Lady Pintos' only four blocks.
In the second set, California picked up right where they left off by grabbing a 6-2 lead. Strickfaden had another block and a kill, and Meyer had two kills during the first six points. The Lady Tigers cut the Lady Pintos' lead to one three different times, but couldn't overcome extended runs by California.
"I was happy to finally see us come out and play strong in a second set," Bailey said. "They weren't letting anything hit the floor. Our girls were going after everything."
The Lady Pintos used runs of five, four and three to put away Versailles and win the second set 25-19.
"I would of liked to see us hit more," Bailey said. "We were tipping a lot of stuff over pushing a lot stuff, a lot of junk. I would of liked to see us turn a lot more of that into hits, because I think it would have been an even bigger gap. They definitely had the mindset of not letting anything hit the floor."
It took the JVA squad three sets to defeat Versailles' junior varsity team, winning 25-21, 26-28, 25-19.
In the first set, California led 17-16 then pulled away to win by four. Leading 21-20 in the second set, the game was tied at 22-22 and 23-23 before Versailles grabbed the 25-24 advantage. The Lady Pintos won the next two points to take a 26-25 lead, but Versailles won the next three points for the set win. After California had its lead cut to 14-12 in the third set, it won the next 11 of 18 points to close out the match.
The Lady Pintos' varsity defeated Tipton Monday night in straight sets (25-6, 25-20), and the JVB and JVA teams also won 2-0 in each of its games.
Strickfaden led the offensive attack with six kills. Meyer and Ashtyn Goans contributed five and four kills, respectively. Emma Bailey recorded 11 aces on 22 attempts and had 10 assists.