No. 7 Orange Lutheran falls to Redondo

The visiting Redondo Union girls volleyball team had just a little bit more success to take down Orange Lutheran on Tuesday night.

The Seahawks, who are ranked second in CIF-SS Division 1AA, swept the Lancers, 26-24, 25-22, 25-22.

The Lancers (7-2), who are ranked seventh in the county, are also ranked seventh in Division 1AA.

Orange Lutheran had the look of a team that was going to be able to extend the match to a fourth set, leading 18-14 in the third.

However, the Seahawks (8-3) didn't go away, scoring seven consecutive points, three on aces by Brianna Lanktree.

Orange Lutheran was able to regroup and to take a 22-21 lead, but again the Seahawks went on a run, closing the match with four consecutive points, all kills from Skylar Dykstra. She ended up with 18 kills.

"Our serve receive broke down a little bit," Orange Lutheran coach Andrew Mabry said. "That was a pretty clean match, I thought, all across the board.

"The difference was we gave them a four-point run in Game 2, a four-point run in Game 3 ... It is hard to beat a team like that when you give them four points in a row. (Inspite of) a couple of errors here and there, I'm proud of what we did tonight."

Taylor Wheatley led Orange Lutheran with 12 kills.

"We're young and learning and this is a tough loss, but Redondo definitely earned it, they played well tonight," Mabry said. "The things we talk about here are every day making sure we're improving in some way.

"Every time we walk through the door, we want to get better whether it is practice or a match whether it is a win or a loss ... I think we got better tonight."

In a nonleague match:

No. 10 Mission Viejo 3, No. 9 Huntington Beach 1: The host Diablos (5-0) dropped the first set, but rallied to win the next three, taking the match 24-26, 25-21, 25-23, 25-17 against the visiting Oilers (6-3).

Alyssa McIvor led Mission Viejo with 27 kills. McIvor had a .429 hitting percentage for the match. Setter Kyra Goodman had 47 assists.

In the Empire League:

Kennedy 3, Valencia 0: Alexis Brown had 15 kills and Saipele Sala added 10 as the Fighting Irish swept the visiting Tigers, 25-17, 25-16, 25-16.

Contact the writer: dcalhoun@ocregister.com