North Farmington's varsity volleyball team pushed Cass Tech to five sets on the road Tuesday, Sept. 22, before falling 3-2 in Detroit.
The Raiders won the opening set 25-22 and evened the match in the fourth set with another 25-22 victory. But Cass Tech took the second set 26-24, the third 25-20 and the decisive fifth set 15-10, according to MaxPreps.
The non-conference loss drops North Farmington to 3-9-2 on the season. Cass Tech, a Detroit school, entered the match at 9-12.
The five-set battle marked a step up for a North Farmington squad that opened the year with four straight losses at the Power Series tournament on Aug. 22. The Raiders dropped all four matches in two sets each against Utica Eisenhower, Walled Lake Western, Brighton and Saline.
North Farmington picked up its first win Sept. 2 against Riverview, then dropped matches to Walled Lake Northern and Troy, both by 0-3, before going 1-1-1 at the Fraser Tournament on Sept. 12 and beat Belleville 3-1 on the road Sept. 17. The Cass Tech match was the Raiders' first five-set contest of the season.
The match turned on thin margins. North Farmington let the second set slip by two points, then clawed back in the fourth to force a decider. Cass Tech pulled away in the fifth.
North Farmington is scheduled to visit Farmington for a cross-district rivalry match Thursday, Sept. 24, at 7 p.m. Farmington enters that non-league contest at 2-4-1.
