CALDWELL, Idaho – Down a set and trailing 8-1 in Set 4, The College of Idaho rallied behind a raucous crowd to stun Southern Oregon 20-25, 25-13, 18-25, 25-23, 15-13, to claim their seventh-straight Cascade Conference regular-season title.
Box Score
The victory for the No. 15 ranked Lady Yotes (18-6, 15-2 CCC) was their 70th-straight CCC home win and secured the right to host the CCC Championships, next Friday and Saturday.
Leading two sets to one, the Raiders (18-9, 14-3) got three Haley Kasler kills in a seven-point push to open the period, and took a 17-11 lead on another Kasler spike. The Yotes fought back with a 9-1 run, keyed by two kills and three blocks from Jessica Peacock, to take a 20-18 lead. SOU was not done, as a Nikki Keller kill gave the visitors a 23-21 lead – but four straight Raider hitting errors, aided by a pair of blocks from Liz Myers, evened the match at two sets apiece.
In the deciding period, a Keller-Natalie Scheller block gave Southern an 8-5 lead at the change-over, but the Coyotes evened the set up at 10-10 on a Kylee Nawahine kill. After six side-outs, a kill by Peacock gave the host match point, with a great dig from Sierra Porter setting up a Nawahine kill to end the match.
The match was see-saw early on, as SOU used a 10-2 run midway through Set 1 to grab the early lead, while the Lady Yotes evened the match up in Set 2 by sprinting to a 19-7 lead. Scheller had five kills in Set 3, as SOU used a 6-1 run late in the frame to take the 2-1 lead, but could not hold on.
Peacock led the Yotes with 17 kills, 14 digs, and five blocks, with Torrey Hulsey logging 14 kills and four blocks. Myers had 13 kills and a team-high six blocks, while Porter had a career-high eight kills, 57 assists, and six digs. Janel Porter led the Yotes with 25 digs.
Scheller led all players with 22 kills and five blocks for the Raiders, with Kasler recording 15 kills. Caryn Westrick had 30 assists and nine digs in the loss, with Renee Yomtob recording 21 digs.
The Lady Yotes close out the regular-season tomorrow night, hosting Oregon Tech at 7 p.m. – the final home regular-season match for seniors Peacock, Hulsey, Cassie Low, and Madison Curtis.
