Seth Schwartzberg is an ASU Cronkite School of Journalism student assigned to cover Perry High School for AZPreps365

GILBERT -- The Perry girls volleyball team is on a roll and they stayed solid Tuesday against the Basha Bears, winning  in four sets, 25-12. 17-25, 25-14, 25-14.

Basha (10-5, 0-1) came into the match hot, winning eight of their last nine to face an even hotter Pumas team, who came in in the midst of a 9-1 stretch over their last 10 matches.

“We had a good night,” Perry coach Andrew Yamashiro said. “Our right side, Caitlin Simmons, had a great night and then we were a force at the net on the block, so we just have to keep building on that.”

This match was all about which team could get on a run.

After the first set, the Pumas (12-4, 1-0) looked to be in business. After jumping out to a 6-1 lead, they rode the momentum till the finish, ending on an 11-4 run to take the first set 25-12.

That momentum was quickly drained entering the second set after the Bears jumped out to an 18-8 lead thanks to a massive 16-6 run. The Pumas came back a little bit to make it close, but not enough to close the gap, dropping the second set 17-25.

“I thought we did better than we have,” Simmons said. “I just feel like during that second set, we could have done better and just stayed calm.”

The third and fourth set were all Pumas, who ran away with the game starting around the middle of the third set. 

With the Bears up 10-8 in the third set, the Pumas started their domination, going on a 17-4 run to help them close out the set and take a 2-1 lead. 

The fourth set, which despite some back-and-forth between the Puma players, their coaches and the referees, was, once again, all Pumas from the get-go.

Kicking off the set with all the momentum on their side, the Pumas jumped out to an 11-5 lead. The Bears got a few of their own back to close the gap, but it wasn’t enough to keep up, eventually dropping the set 25-14 and losing 3-1.

“We had a good three sets,” Yamashiro said. “They played clean volleyball in set two, but we picked it up in sets three and four. We just have this young person’s mentality sometimes where we take some off (the gas) and we have to reset ourselves.”

The majority of the highlights for the Pumas fell on two players for the Pumas; Simmons and freshman Sophia Gregg.

“It gives us a lot of confidence going forward,” Simmons said. “It just gives us confidence that we can and will win.”

Gregg, who came into the season as a setter, has shined on the outside for the Pumas this season, racking up a team-high 13 kills and tied for a team-high in aces with two on Tuesday.

Simmons, playing opposite of Gregg, had 10 kills. 

The Pumas were also helped out a lot by errors. In just the third set alone, the Bears tallied 10 different errors, whether that be on serves or hits, all resulting in points for the Pumas.

“Small mistakes,” Yamashiro said when asked what his team can improve upon. “We were trying to hit harder and harder when we weren’t finding the good success that we were normally finding, so it felt that we had to do more with every swing.”

The Pumas will hope to carry this momentum into the Nike Tournament of Champions, starting on Friday at 12:15 p.m. at the Arizona Athletic Grounds in Mesa.