The Montgomery County volleyball team couldn’t have asked for a better way to start off the October portion of its schedule on Oct. 1.

The Wildcats snapped a six-match losing streak and picked up their first home win of the season after defeating the Mexico Bulldogs in five games at Ballew & Snell Court. MCHS won 25-16, 25-10, 20-25, 21-25 and 15-11 to improve to 6-12-2.

“It was a big win for us at home,” MCHS senior Khloe Kribbs said.

Now, the Wildcats are setting their sights on continuing their winning ways for the rest of October. They have just four matches and a tournament left in their regular season. They will compete in the Class 2, District 6 tournament at Hermann later this month.

“We have some really good competitive games left this season,” MCHS coach Carli Bleyle said. “The girls are just getting better. Everytime they haven’t peaked. So knowing that they’re getting better every game and that we’re working and improving things that we’ve been doing in practice is really encouraging to see. That’s right where you want them going into districts.”

The Wildcats were scheduled to play a road match against Centralia on Oct. 6. They have home matches remaining against Bowling Green (Oct. 8), Hallsville (Oct. 12) and Centralia (Oct. 15) and are scheduled to compete in the Eldon Tournament on Oct. 10.

The Oct. 12 match against Hallsville is the Wildcats’ annual Pink Out contest in which they honor local citizens who are fighting cancer.

“That will be very, very competitive,” Bleyle said. “Hallsville is always excellent and they are on a good streak right now. That will be a really good game to be here for.”

The Wildcats will celebrate senior night as five seniors – Kribbs, Reaghan Hemeyer, Dakota Marion, Megan Pierson and Addison Brower – will play their final home match.

“Whenever that last whistle blows, it’s going to be hard, especially playing with these girls and practicing with the JV and stuff,” Kribbs said. “I’ve been playing with these girls since I was in eighth grade. It’s going to be hard to leave them and even leave the coaches.”

The Wildcats lost their first six home matches before coming out on top against Mexico. They came back from a 6-3 deficit in the fifth game to win the match over the Audrain County school.

“It’s definitely nice to be going into districts and going into the next couple of weeks with a boost of confidence like, ‘We can’t lose. We are a good team. We are a strong team that is capable of winning,’” Kribbs said.

The Wildcats went on a 6-0 run to take a 9-6 lead they never relinquished. During that run, Kribbs recorded back-to-back kills and junior Emma Cobb served five points.

Bleyle said she was pleased with the way her team performed with one of its players, Mieka Ray, being out with an injury.

“My younger girls have done an excellent job stepping up and helping fill that role because that’s a big gap to fill Mieka’s spot,” Bleyle said. “So my girls have done an excellent job coming in when I needed them to help make the team work. This was good. They needed to know they could be down, come back and finish again.”

After the win over Mexico, the Wildcats enjoyed the weekend off after playing seven matches and a tournament in a span of 12 days.

“They were exhausted, but it helps them to know that they can play through exhaustion,” Bleyle said. “If they can play that well when they are tired and get plenty of rest, they are on top of their game. So it was a good mental challenge for them to have all of those games in that tournament for them to know they are very capable of pushing through when they are tired. It was good.”

Kribbs said she was happy that she and her teammates survived the grueling schedule.

“It takes a lot of team confidence, a lot of picking each other up and being there and supporting each other to be able to go through hard weeks like that and to stay up and not to be too tired to get your schoolwork done,” she said.