FAIRHOPE, Ala.—The defending Panhandle Christian Conference volleyball champion Central Christian Saints took a 3-1, but hard-fought win at start-up Bayshore Christian’s Eagle Gym Thursday  21-25, 25-12, 25-12, 25-23.

The Saints dominated the second and third sets after falling behind 0-1, but also had to fight off a furious home-court, match-point surge in game four to collect the victory in the best-of-five games format.

The first-year Eagles led by sophomore, freshman and middle school players who finished a strong game one after holding off late rallies by Central which has two seniors this year. The Saints lost seven seniors to graduation from last year’s title-run team and are playing several first-year varsity players in 2013.

“It’s not so much a rebuilding year, but a regrouping since all of these girls have been playing together and for me at some level for a while now,” said CC head coach Renee Crotts. “I did have to pull up several JV players at one time, so we’re definitely younger than the last couple of years. I was proud of the way they stayed in there when we got behind. My setter, Nikki Gibbs, is a newbie to the position—she’s never set before. But she’s doing a great job. We didn’t hit consistently well in that first game. Hit too many balls out. But then got our serve popping and had some good scoring runs the rest of the match. Bayshore is improving and will keep getting better. They have some very good athletes and are well coached.”

The Lady Eagles (0-4) are still looking for that first historic win and for a while Thursday had some folks in the Bayshore gym— including head coach Dave Omtvedt—feeling the big day may have arrived. The Saints won 3-0 over Bayshore when they hosted the Eagles earlier in the season in Robertsdale.

“We started off great, but we are stilling building this thing,” Omtvedt said.  “And learning how to keep that level of play going for a whole match is just one of those things that you don’t so much teach, but just have to put them out there in the situation and kind of let them grow from the experience.”

“Overall, I think we showed so much improvement since the first we played them. We made some changes to our offense and defense. Added a libero. And after that first game I thought, maybe, maybe. But we made too many mistakes, young mistakes. Mostly correctable mistakes, but still takes time. In the first game we forced errors and made fewer. But we need to be more consistent from one game to the next, also.”

“(Coach Crotts) made some  smart decisions that helped turn it around for them,” he added. “She has a good solid team and playing them has helped us get better.”

The Saints were led by Becky Shelton with nine kills, Cheyenne Adams added eight kills and seven service aces,    Gibbs finished with 23 assists.

Stat leaders for Bayshore were Sydney Omtvedt with 12 set assists, eight kills and three ace serves, Natalie Omtvedt had 13 kills, eight set assists and five service aces. Priscilla Brock added one block.