When Long Reach volleyball coach Jacqueline Armstead saw her team's performance in a first set loss at Oakland Mills Thursday night, she thought she was the vicitim of a prank.

"I asked them if it was a Halloween trick they were trying to play on me," said Armstead, whose team rallied to win 20-25, 25-10, 25-21, 25-17. "But then they were able to pull it together."

Oakland Mills' Asma Qaiyumi went on an eight-point serving run in that first set, including two aces and four Long Reach errors, and the Scorpions built a 16-5 lead before Long Reach finally began to stir.

Oakland Mills took another lead of 5-2 in the second set, but Long Reach rallied back to take a 14-8 lead, and closed the set with an 11-1 run as Oakland Mills faltered with five consecutive miscues to account for Long Reach's last five points. The Lightning again dug out of a hole in the third set, after trailing, 9-3, but never fell behind in the fourth and final set.

It was Long Reach's second win of the season, after defeating Wilde Lake on Oct. 11.

Armstead said that her team had been due for success after taking Hammond, Howard and Mt. Hebron to five sets.

"We've been slowly getting better, so it was nice for them to get another W," she said. "We've definitely seen a very slow, steady progression which is nice. You hate to peak in the middle, we're definitely starting to peak now."

Long Reach's top outside hitter, junior Cailin Fredrickson, started off slow on Thursday, with two kills combined between the first two sets, but caught fire in the last two, with five kills in the third set and eight in the fourth.

She finished with a team-high 15 kills and five aces, and surpassed 100 kills for the season.

"I still have a lot of areas I have to work on, but I think I just needed to get myself together from the first game," she said. "We had our (homecoming) pep rally today so … we realized that we just had to get this win, the team was really excited, we needed to bring some pride back to Long Reach."

Alison Dorsey also had a strong performance for the Lightning, with 12 kills and four point blocks. Cailin's twin sister, Shelby — the team's setter — had three kills and two aces. Jessica Dubbs and McKenzie Langford each served three aces.

In the loss, Oakland Mills got a balanced offensive performance from Shannen McKay (eight kills), Daria Hypolite (5), Samantha Slebodnik (5) and Ceaira Thomas (4). Libero Allie Cable chipped in 14 digs, four aces and two kills. Heidi Larsen, Asma Qaiyumi and Toneah Bryant each tallied three aces, and Hannah Scott led the Scorpions block at the net, with two point blocks.

"Even though our record doesn't show it we're just a few steps away from being really competitive," said coach Dan Tucci, whose team has claimed sets from Atholton, Hammond and Howard. "We haven't played a complete match all season long, so I'm still looking for that from start to finish."

Long Reach did not win its first match last season until Oct. 28, the final day of the regular season. They defeated Oakland Mills for that win, after losing to the Scorpions in five sets earlier in the season, and followed it up with a first round playoff win over Southern of Anne Arundel.

"We live in an area where it's not all club players like some other teams, so we have to push that much harder against the teams that are very good ... but we always like to challenge ourselves," said Cailin Fredrickson. "We've worked really hard in practice. We've been pushing ourselves harder and we've just started connecting."

Around the league

Glenelg defeated Howard, 25-23, 19-25, 25-14, 23-25, 15-7.

Erin Jollata and Allie James each had three aces for the Gladiators, while Morgan Perry (14 kills) and Aly Dillon (11) led the offense. Jollata also made six point blocks.

"What a tough match," Glenelg coach Don Beall said. "Howard really played well. Their back row hitting was really good."

Reservoir defeated Wilde Lake, 25-9, 25-18, 22-25, 25-10.

Kelsea Belt led the Gators with 21 kills, following up a record breaking performance on Tuesday night, when she finished a five-set win over Marriotts Ridge with 25 kills, breaking a school record set by 2007 graduate Jamie Thomas, who once had 22 kills in a match.

River Hill improved to 11-0 with a dominant showing at Atholton, winning 25-12, 25-22, 25-5.