By ALEX SPONSELLER After losing back to back matches against Portsmouth and Classical, the Pilgrim girls volleyball team bounced back to sweep host Tolman 3-0 (25-20/25-13/25-14) last week to get back into the win column. 

The Lady Pats won a tough first set but would jump out to big leads early in the next two sets to set the tone and grab control down the stretch.

“We’ve been working on serve, receive and take the ball right back and to hold on to that control. It didn’t work so well in our past games so we’ve been working on that. That and putting the ball away and taking charge,” said Pilgrim coach Jason Metivier after the win.

With a shortened schedule this season, Metivier and company were happy to get back to their winning ways and stop the bleeding.

“We had a good start against Portsmouth going up two sets but then we kind of played down and they took over. We played all right against classical and dropped that one. It’s good to get back on track,” said Metivier, who has also been happy with the leadership of the upperclassmen including captain Kiley Chaplin.

“Kiley is loud and we depend on her to lead the girls. She does a lot for us and she’s a good leader,” said Metivier.

As the Pats get set for the home stretch of the regular season, they hope to continue to work on the fundamentals and stay hot moving forward.

“It’s a mental thing, it’s focus and serving. There were times in those two games that we would score and get the ball back and then misserve, it was a total momentum killer. So we’ve been working on that,” said Metivier.

“It’s so crucial, we’re already past the halfway point of the season to these wins are big. We’re planning on riding this momentum.”