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JONESBOROUGH—East battled like crazy to keep its volleyball winning streak alive but host David Crockett captured a 3-2 triumph Tuesday night by claiming a 15-7 win in the fifth and deciding set.

The Lady Hurricanes, who had won nine straight, battled back twice to even the match but the Lady Pioneers, who improved to 15-7 for the season, rode the hitting of Sophia Gouge and Brylee Tullock to the win as the two combined for seven kills.

Crockett won the opening game in convincing fashion, 25-10, before the Lady ‘Canes rallied for a 25-21 decision in the second set. The home team then won 25-18 before East forced the deciding set with a 25-18 victory in the fourth set.

Gouge led the winning attack with 18 kills but had lots of help from Kamryn Martin with nine, Tullock with six and Kara Coggins with five.

East fell to 12-4 for the season despite 11 kills from Reagan Forester. Hannah Hall added 10 and Riley Forester six.

Tullock served four aces for the Lady Pioneers while Gouge added three. Harmony Sullivan and Reagan Forester had two apiece for the Lady Hurricanes.

The Lady ‘Canes are back in action on Thursday night when they play host to cross-town rival West in an important District Two 3-A match. West is currently in first place and unbeaten in the district while East has one loss with that coming at the hands of the Lady Trojans.

East lost to Crockett by 3-1 at home earlier in the season and first-year Lady ‘Canes coach Courtney Dotson felt her team played better this time around.

“The first set was a little rough for us but after that I thought the girls settled down and played pretty well. There’s a lot of things that we’re still working through.”

She added, “We’re short-staffed right now and it makes if tough. When you play a good team in a five-set match and they’ve used so many subs while we’re playing the same people all the time, it’s hard.

“I was proud of the way the girls pushed through after starting out really rough,” she added. “The fact that we were able to come back and get our head in the game was rally good on our part. I wish it would have ended on a better note heading to Thursday.”

Dotson closed, “Hopefully, we’ll come out then with a little more fire. Especially with us playing at our place in a really big match.”

Crockett had things its own way in the first set. East scored the first point, but the Lady Pioneers came back with four straight and never trailed again.

It was still close at 7-5 when the home team reeled off a 13-3 run to take total control of the set. East never got closer than 11 after that with Crockett scoring the final four points.

Things were a lot closer in set two. There were nine ties and five lead changes. The final tie came at 18-18 in the middle of a five-point run by the Lady Hurricanes that wiped out an 18-16 deficit.

The Lady Pioneers fought back and trailed by just 23-21 when both Forester sisters nailed kills to end the set.

East scored the first two in the third set and was in front by 10-7 when Crockett used a 10-2 burst for a five-point lead of its own.

After the Lady ‘Canes closed within 19-16, an ace by Tullock and kill by Coggins helped push the advantage to 23-16. East scored twice but two straight hitting errors ended the set.

The fourth set saw East get away to an early lead and hold the upper hand until the Lady Pioneers scored three straight to tie it at 9-9. The home team moved on out to a 14-12 margin but Hailey Hall had two kills and Reagan Forester served a pair of aces as the Lady Hurricanes took the lead for good with a five-point run.

After Crockett scored, Hannah Hall scored two straight points and then added another along with a kill by Riley Forester to give East a 22-16 margin.

The Lady ‘Canes closed out the set with the final three points.

However, Gouge and Laney Britton had kills to start the deciding set and East never caught up.

Sullivan scored for the Lady Hurricanes but Crockett added four more and coasted to the victory.