The Long Beach City College Women's Volleyball team held early leads in both the first and second sets before errors doomed the Vikings in a 3-0 loss at Cerritos College in both teams' South Coast Conference opener on Friday night. LBCC lost the match by scores of 25-20, 25-19, and 25-18.
In the opener, Long Beach jumped out to a 13-5 lead before four LBCC errors aided the Falcons' rally. Cerritos eventually jumped ahead 16-15 and scored nine of the final 14 points of set to pull off the win.
In the second, sophomore Lauren Christensen (Valley Christian HS) totaled three early kills to help lead the Vikings to an early 6-1 advantage. But just like in the first set, the Falcons started chipping away and took advantage of several Viking attack errors to climb back into the game. A pair of errors by freshman Alexxis Todd (Lynwood HS), coupled with Falcon kills from Valerie Montoya and Natalie Cervantes put Cerritos on top, 14-12. The Falcons would not relinquish the lead the rest of the night and received two kills from Vega, with Long Beach making five attack errors the remainder of the set.
The Falcons opened an 8-2 lead in the third set, paced by four LBCC attack errors and kills from four different players. Cerritos led from start to finish and were even up, 24-14 before the Vikings scored four straight points. An attack error, the 22nd of the night by Long Beach, secured the win for the Falcons.
Christensen led the Vikings with eight kills while freshman Kassidy Harrington (Western HS) added seven kills and 13 digs. Sophomore Helen Marangos (Santa Fe HS) chipped in with six kills, two blocks, and an ace.
Long Beach lost its fifth straight and saw its record drop to 2-9 overall and 0-1 in conference play. The Vikings return to action on Wednesday (Oct. 7) at 6 p.m. when they travel to East Los Angeles College for a SCC match.