Cougars battle deep into third set, fall to Athenians

BAINBRIDGE — The night started off poorly for the North Putnam Cougar volleyball team on Tuesday night.

The Crawfordsville Athenians visited and thrashed the Cougars in the opening set, 25-8, but North rallied to lose a close second set just 25-22. The final set will go down as a loss in the scorebooks and an Athenian win, but the 35-33 defeat showed the Cougars a lot of promise despite the sweep.

North Putnam dropped to 4-12 on the season, while future Monon Athletic rival improved to 9-6. The Cougars showed a ton of heart in rallying after a rough first set.

“We have been struggling to find our identity and that first set did not go the way we wanted it to, but the girls kept fighting. They competed in the second set and then really gave it their all in the third set,” North Putnam head coach Jenny Heron said.

Crawfordsville dominated the first set. The Athenians jumped out to an 8-0 lead behind four aces from Ellie Walker and extended the lead to 14-1 before the Cougars were able to muster any offense.

Mack Mason and Maylee Mason scored points for the Cougars to get them within 10 at 15-5, but Crawfordsville ripped off another eight straight points to take a 23-5 lead and coasted to the 25-8 first set victory.

“I didn’t see their heads go down after that first set. Crawfordsville is a really good team,” Heron said.

The second set looked like it would be a repeat of the first as the Athenians jumped to a 5-1 lead, but this time the Cougars battled back.

Tori Detro had a big block, followed by a pair of Mack Mason kills and the Cougars led 6-4. The teams battled back and forth until a 6-0 run by Crawfordsville boosted the lead to 15-10.

North battled back as Morgan Berry had a kill, Melanie Davies an ace and a great save by Mason picked up a point and the Cougars were right back into it.

Crawfordsville was slowly able to get the lead back to 22-18, but just like earlier, the Cougars rallied. Two Davies kills, a Hailee Daigle ace followed by an Athenian error tied the set at 22-22.

Crawfordsville picked up the next point following a long back-and-forth rally between the two squads and losing that point made a big difference as the Athenians were able to close out the match 25-22.

“I saw us come together in that second set and compete. We really seemed to start loving volleyball again as a team,” Heron said.

What turned out to be the final set of the night was a thriller that saw an extra 18 points scored. North Putnam twice put together runs to get out to a lead but could not keep the talented Athenians from rallying.

North opened an early lead as Detro had a kill and a block to give them a 9-5 lead. Crawfordsville cut the lead to one at 10-9, but North spurted ahead again as a balanced offense saw Detro, Maylee Mason and Morgan Berry all pick up points and take a 17-12 lead.

The run continued after an Athenian point as Detro and Berry kept scoring and the Cougar defense was tough, propelling them to a 23-16 lead and seemingly in command.

A Cougar service error started the Athenian rally as Olivia Hedrick picked up three aces during a 6-0 run and cut the Cougar lead to 23-21. Davies had a smart directional kill to establish the first of many set points, but Crawfordsville ended up tying the score at 24-24.

That set up a run of nine more ties as the third set continued with a lot of great rallies and saves by both squads. Crawfordsville’s Allie Strickland had a kill to give the Athenians a 34-33 lead and a Cougar error allowed them to travel back home with the three-set victory, this one 35-33.

“I am really proud of how we battled back. We played as a team and improved as it went on. I told them we have four weeks until sectionals and that we need to get 25 percent better each week. They responded and it was good to see,” Heron said.

The Cougars have an away Western Indiana Conference matchup with Northview on Thursday night.