The Irvine Valley women’s volleyball team shook off a bit of rust after not playing in two weeks to pull out a four-game win over Riverside Friday night in an Orange Empire Conference opening match at Irvine Valley.

Irvine Valley, ranked fourth in the state, won, 25-16, 24-26, 25-20, 25-20, on Dig Pink Volleyball Project Breast Cancer Awareness Night.

Nearly 400 fans were in attendance for the event, which featured free Asics pink T-shirts, along with raffles and auctions to raise funds in support of breast cancer awareness. All proceeds were donated to breast cancer research.

Irvine Valley, which dressed in specially made pink uniforms, was led by sophomore outside hitter Katie Wilkerson. She finished with team highs in kills (18), digs (14) and aces (five).

Wilkerson had back-to-back kills in the fourth and final game to give IVC a 23-18 lead.

And she closed out the game and the match with another kill four points later.

Freshman Ellie Wiekmap paced IVC early on and finished with 17 kills. Hillary Crone (eight kills) and Caitlin Segert (six kills) also contributed offensively for the Lasers.

Sophomore Nichole May added nine digs and sophomore setter Allie Hammer had a season-high 48 assists to go along with five digs for Irvine Valley, which stayed unbeaten on the season at 5-0.

Irvine Valley hadn’t played a match since Sept. 18 when it swept San Diego City on the road. The Lasers had their scheduled home contest with Moorpark for last week canceled because the fires in the Moorpark area made it tough for the Raiders to travel.

"At times we looked like a team that hadn’t played in a while," IVC Coach Tom Pestolesi said. "We were inconsistent and can play a lot better, but there were also some positives. We had some kids step up. Riverside was also pretty good. They are well coached and they really battled."

Riverside, which was ranked 21st in the state, saw its record slip to 7-3 overall.

Irvine Valley plays again next Wednesday, hosting Fullerton in a conference match at 6 p.m.