The Levelland Loboettes volleyball team battled through serve-receive struggles and two very competitive sets, but the undefeated Lady Lopes completed the threegame sweep Tuesday night in Abernathy .
Game one was a slow, rough start for the Loboettes as Abernathy took charge with a 4-1 lead and two aces.
Receiving serves proved to be a constant struggle for Levelland, with Abernathy landing six aces in game one with Lady Lope Tatum Bailey claiming five of those.
Soon after the threepoint lead, Levelland tied the game 6-6 after the Lady Lopes netted the ball and a kill shot came from sophomore middle hitter, Kamryn Navarro. However, Abernathy would go on to push their lead to 10-6 with a kill, an ace, and two Loboettes errors.
The Lady Lopes jumped to a 20-12 lead before claiming the win 25-12.
The Loboettes saw more adversity with only two kills. Levelland had 12 serve attempts with five service points while Abernathy scored 17 service points with six kills and aces. Neither team had a block and Levelland was held to just two aces by senior middle Abigail Heseman.
Game two saw Abernathy gain a 6-3 lead that resulting from Levelland errors, but the Loboettes came back to tie the game at 8-8 with the help of a kill off of Heseman and sophomore outside hitter Lola Potter.
Game two was back-and-forth for the rest of the set with the biggest point-margin being three.
Things heated up and started clicking when the Loboettes went from just two kills in game one to nine in game two and held Abernathy to just five, but not enough to allow Levelland to win due to miscommunication errors as well as five Lady Lope aces. Abernathy claimed the victory 25-22.
Levelland claimed one block, collected 22 serve attempts and had three faults. Abernathy had three blocks.
Game three proved to be closer with backand- forth rallies and constant lead changes. It was also a kill zone as the Loboettes claimed seven and Abernathy put 13 on the books.
Game three was tied at 19-19 and again at 24-24 as Levelland tried to force a game four, but the Lady Lopes claimed four kills and the Loboettes had several errors and a net violation, giving the win to Abernathy 26-24 and advancing them to an undefeated 8-0.
Heseman put up three aces and two kills, Navarro and Potter each had two kills, senior outside hitter Mia Sepulbeda claimed three, while senior defensive specialist Zuriah Vargas had two, and sophomore London Branch had one kill for a total of 18 kills for the Loboettes.
The Lady Lopes claimed 23 total kills as well as 13 aces and one block, while Levelland had three Heseman aces and five blocks.
Levelland’s record is 2-5 as they head into the Lubbock-Cooper tournament on Aug. 20. The Loboettes will also be playing Loop and Plains on Aug. 25 at home.