Wherever a Jefferson City Lady Jay hit the ball, it was likely a Helias Lady Crusader was there for the dig Tuesday night.
And whenever the Lady Jays would score a point, the Lady Crusaders were likely to respond with a kill.
It all added up to a 25-19, 25-16, 25-23 victory for Helias at Fleming Fieldhouse.
"Our defense has been playing really well," Helias coach David Harris said. "Last night I think we had over 100 digs. And our serve-receive went very well with it tonight."
The Lady Crusaders made it a habit of trailing by about four or five points in each set before taking control about midway through.
Jefferson City led the first set 10-7 after kills by Paige Reeser, Claire Stegeman and Rhakala Blackmon.
Helias got back within one at 11-10 when Grace Wilding placed the ball in the back corner for a kill and a Chapel Dobbs kill gave Helias the lead for good at 13-12.
Annica Luebbering's defense later turned into offense when her dig on a hard hit by Blackmon went over the net and dropped for a 16-12 lead.
Luebbering had 15 digs and Lacey Heidbrink led with 25 digs at the libero spot.
"We have very good defensive players," Harris said. "You can't cover everything, but you try to read what their hitter's doing and what their tendencies are and we did a pretty good job of that tonight."
Reeser and Kayla Walters got the Lady Jays rolling early in the second set. Walters smacked one to the back corner to tie it at 2, Reeser followed with back-to-back kills and Walters hit one across the court for a kill and a 5-2 lead.
Hannah Vogt capped off the 6-0 run with one of her two aces.
Walters led Jefferson City with 14 kills and added six digs, while Reeser had seven kills, four blocks, 14 assists and 18 digs.
Jefferson City held onto that lead for awhile, as one of Sarah Linthacum's five blocks made it 10-7 and a Reeser block put the lead to 14-10.
Jefferson City recorded 13 blocks in the match.
"That's a pretty good night," Jefferson City coach Lisa Hoffmeyer said. "I think the biggest area where we differentiated tonight is when we blocked them they picked it up and kept the ball alive, when they blocked us we didn't do the work to keep it alive."
Dobbs got a big block for Helias to tie it at 14 and another for a 19-15 lead. Dobbs led Helias with 15 kills and four blocks.
Helias scored the final six points of the second set.
"They're always a very well coached team, very disciplined on defense and just make a lot of those hustle plays to keep balls alive," Hoffmeyer said. "We kind of expected that and we definitely got it tonight. I would say they frustrated us defensively on multiple occasions."
Jefferson City scored three of the first four points of the third set, but the lead evaporated as a Heidbrink ace made it 4-3.
The lead reached 16-12 when Landrey VanOverschelde assisted Dobbs for a kill.
VanOverschelde led with 20 assists and Grace Verslues added 16 assists.
Jefferson City took a timeout trailing 21-16.
"Just the fact that we had the answer inside us and we needed to stop looking around confused and wondering and worrying and just go be competitive," Hoffmeyer said. "Do the things that you're capable of doing and stay loose, have fun playing the game and just compete."
Out of the timeout, Ada Humphrey and Linthacum each had a kill to start a 6-0 run to take the lead at 22-21.
Linthacum tied it at 23 with a kill before kills by Helias' Sydney Mingucci and Jacie Buschjost ended it.
Wilding added eight kills for Helias.
For Jefferson City, Jordan Niermeyer tallied 11 digs and Sydney Vogt added 10.
Jefferson City (9-9-2) is back at home Thursday when it hosts Hickman.
Helias (22-2-2) will host Borgia on Thursday at Rackers Fieldhouse.
Helias defeated Jefferson City 25-15, 25-14 in the JV match to improve to 20-5-1.
Ava Millard had 12 service points and seven digs, Tori Schmidt had 11 digs, 10 service points and eight assists and Summer Hake added five kills and two blocks.
For Jefferson City, Brianna Avey tallied six assists, three digs and two kills, Izabell Johnston had four kills and Elicia Theroff had three kills and three blocks.
Jefferson City's JV team is 11-6-4.
Helias won the freshman match 25-21, 25-9 to improve to 14-4-1.
Adalyn Koelling and Madison Kempker each had five kills for Helias. Sarah Holloway led with seven assists and Maryn Randolph led with 10 digs.
For Jefferson City, Kadence Kiesling tallied 10 assists and six digs and Lauryn Heisler had seven kills and four digs.
Jefferson City's freshman team is 5-7-1.