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Columbia hitter Autumn Jones returns a shot against Lowndes on Thursday night. (JORDAN KROEGER/Lake City Reporter)
No team has been able to stop Columbia this month.
Lowndes couldn’t Thursday night either.
Another balanced effort paced the Tigers in a 26-24, 25-19, 13-25, 25-13 win over the Vikings at home for their ninth straight victory. Their front line kept the Lowndes defense off-balance all night as Autumn Jones and Kayla Goodloe had eight kills apiece, while Sinei Wood and Cassidy O’Neal each had six kills.
Columbia (11-5) also dominated with its serves, tallying 21 aces that included six from Martiza Patterson. Wood also had five aces to go with her team-high 20 digs, while Myles Fernandez had three aces to go with her team-high 28 assists and 18 digs.
Every match matters right now for the Tigers, who are fighting for a playoff spot. Columbia was 10th in Region 1-5A in this week’s FHSAA rankings with a 4.144 rating, but not far behind Arnold (4.942) for the eighth and final spot. Those rankings don’t include the Tigers’ last five wins yet, which should give them a boost next week.
“They just keep pushing themselves to get better,” Columbia head coach Trudy Andrews said. “They just want it. They want to win. They want to make it into the playoffs and get into that top eight.”
The first set was the only real competitive frame of the match. The Tigers trailed 8-4 early, then 12-8 and then 15-10, but they kept battling back to eventually tie the set at 15 behind a 5-0 spurt.
Lowndes (12-12) retook the lead at 18-15 but Columbia answered with three straight points. The teams were within two points of each other the rest of the set, tying again at 23-23 and 24-24 before the Tigers closed the set with two straight points capped off by a block from O’Neal.
“There’s no quit in them,” Andrews said. “They stay composed and just play their game. They settle in and believe in each other and they know they have each other’s back. When you do that and you want to win, good stuff happens.”
Lowndes struggled to keep the ball in play in the second set, handing Columbia 17 points on either errors or violations. It led to the Tigers building a 20-9 lead before they held off the Vikings for a 25-19 win.
The teams then reversed roles in the third, with Lowndes jumping out to an 11-3 lead. The Vikings had seven aces in the set, which was never close.
“We couldn’t get out of the serve receive,” Andrews said. “We tried to adjust and we couldn’t adjust to it. But you kind of look for those moments because we learn a lot in those trials. We actually learned how to adjust from that in that fourth set, and that’s what we did. And they came back and rocked it.”
The Tigers pulled it back together in the fourth, building a 15-3 advantage to cruise to victory. Jones had her best frame in the fourth, racking up five of her eight kills to help carry Columbia to another win.
Just like on offense, there was plenty of balance defensively too. Haidyn Markham had 16 digs, Jones and O’Neal each had nine digs, and Patterson had eight digs. The Tigers were strong defensively at the net as well, with Goodloe finishing with five blocks while Wood and O’Neal each had four.
“I think that’s what makes us so good,” Andrews said. “And they believe in each other and they know each one of them is going to do their job.”
UP NEXT
Columbia travels to face Newberry on Monday at 6:30 p.m. before returning home Wednesday to take on Dixie County at 7 p.m. for Senior Night.