MITCHELL – It was not exactly a smooth start, but Aberdeen Central weathered the storm and grabbed a volleyball victory over Mitchell Tuesday night.

The Golden Eagles collected a 25-23, 25-15, 22-25, 25-14 Eastern South Dakota Conference triumph.

While Central won the first two sets, things looked bleak out of the blocks as the Kernels bolted out to a 12-3 lead to start the match.

The Eagles were able to regroup and came back to win that crucial opening set. While Mitchell grabbed the third set, Central controlled both the second and fourth sets to win the match.

“We were able to keep them out of system most of the night with our serving,” said Central coach Jackie Bindenagel. “We got a lot of free balls back and could run our offense.”

Central had six aces, led by Sydney Evans with three and Grace Kuch with two, and the aggressive serving helped lead to 48 kills on the evening. Kuch had a team leading 17 of those, while Lauryn Burckhard had a dozen kills and Ashley Wangler eight.

While the Eagles had a high number of kills, they also had more than two dozens hitting errors.

“We had more errors than we should have,” Bindenagel said. “There’s always someothing to work on.”

Arylie Waldo finished the match with 36 set assists, and Evans led the Central defense with 23 digs.

The Golden Eagles, 11-10 on the season, have now won back-to-back road matches. Central continues a long road stretch with a match at Pierre on Saturday.

Serving: Aberdeen Central 87-93 6 aces (Sydney Evans 17-17 3 aces, Grace Kuch 9-12 2 aces, Madison Miller 16-17 1 ace).

Hitting: Aberdeen Central 140-165 48 kills (Kuch 41-47 17 kills, Lauryn Burckhard 30-36 12 kills, Ashley Wangler 22-28 8 kills).

Setting: Aberdeen Central 124-124 39 assists (Arylie Waldo 117-117 36 assists).

Digs: Aberdeen Central 72 (Evans 23, Miller 14, Leah Gough 9, Anna Malchow 8, Sawyer Bahr 8).

Blocks: Aberdeen Central 3 solo 4 assists (Kuch 2 solo 2 assists, Taryn Nieman 1 solo, Gough 2 assists).