Volleyball Preview: Birchwood Christian Warriors vs. Lumen Christi Archangels
After both having extra time off, the Birchwood Christian Warriors and the Lumen Christi Archangels will dust off their jerseys to challenge one another on Tuesday. Birchwood Christian is looking to tack on another W to their eight-game streak on the road dating back to last season.
Birchwood Christian is coming in fresh off a high-stakes matchup with another one of Alaska's top teams: Susitna Valley, who was ranked 19th in their home state at the time (Birchwood Christian was ranked 14th). Birchwood Christian came out on top against Susitna Valley by a score of 3-1 on Tuesday.
Birchwood Christian had a slow start but a hot finish: after dropping the first set, they turned around to win the next three. The match finished with set scores of 23-25, 25-21, 25-15, 25-19.
Birchwood Christian's success was the result of a balanced attack that saw several players step up, but Elli Courtney led the charge by getting two aces and 15 assists.
Birchwood Christian was lethal from the service line and finished the game with 17 aces. That's the most aces they've posted since back in September.
Meanwhile, Lumen Christi made easy work of Cook Inlet Academy on October 11th and carried off a 3-0 victory. The win made it back-to-back victories for the Archangels.
The 3-0 score doesn't show just how dominant Lumen Christi was: they took every set by at least ten points. Once all was said and done, the final score wound up at 25-15, 25-12, 25-15.
Birchwood Christian is on a roll lately: they've won 16 of their last 18 games, which provided a nice bump to their 20-4 record this season. As for Lumen Christi, their record is now 2-0.
Birchwood Christian was able to grind out a solid win over Lumen Christi when the teams last played back in October of 2023, winning 3-1. The rematch might be a little tougher for Birchwood Christian since the team won't have the home-court advantage this time around. We'll see if the change in venue makes a difference.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
