By MATT PIKE
The Mid-Buchanan Dragons volleyball team remained undefeated, and broke a school record while doing it, beating the rival East Buchanan Bulldogs in Faucett 3-1.
The Dragons (25-0) took the first two sets of the match against the Bulldogs. Mid-Buchanan breezed through the first set, beating East Buchanan 25-12 for their 58th consecutive set won on the season, breaking the school record. The Dragons extended the streak to 59 in set two, what turned to a more competitive set between the two rivals, with Mid-Buchanan ultimatelty coming out on top 25-19.
Hitting 59 consecutive sets won, the Dragons were a mere 12 sets away from breaking a state record. Junior Myla Flinn says hitting that record is really exciting.
"We have been putting in a lot of work, and we all just love each other, we're a family, and its just exciting we're all getting to play with each other and we're going this far," Flinn tells reporters after the match.
The streak ended in set three as the Bulldogs took control early, and despite a Dragons rally, held on to win the set 26-24, handing Mid-Buchanan their first set loss of the season. Head coach Ron Underwood says the streak was a fun thing for his team and it would have been great to run the whole season with no sets won against them, however.
"That's not the biggest prize, it's a fun extra thing and its school and everybody likes it, but I'm ok that we lost that set and we can worry about other things now," Underwood says.
The Dragons bounced back in a big way in set four, forcing East Buchanan to burn their timeouts very early, and Mid-Buchanan controlled the set the entire way through winning set four and the match 25-15. Underwood says while he was impressed with how his team bounced back after losing the third set, he was more impressed with how the rallied during set three.
"I actually liked the first response when they had us like 23-18 or whatever, and we came back to make it 24-24, I thought that was the first good response," Underwood explains. "And then we knew we were fine in the fourth one, if we got that close in the third one then we were ok, I thought it was great."
Mid-Buchanan will now play in the Rolla Tournament on Saturday. East Buchanan (16-5-2) will also be in tournament play on Saturday in the Bishop LeBlond Varsity Tournament.
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