The Irvine Valley women's volleyball team bounced back from its first loss of the season (last Friday night in five games at Orange Coast) with a sweep of Santa Ana in an Orange Empire Conference contest Wednesday night at Santa Ana.

IVC, which is ranked sixth in this week's state poll, came out on top, 25-20, 25-14, 25-16, to improve its record to 9-1 overall and 5-1 in conference on the season. 

Santa Ana fell to 3-6 overall.

The two teams battled back-and-forth early in the match to a 9-9 tie. Irvine Valley pulled away to a 15-12 lead, the largest in the early stages before the Dons battled back to cut the lead to 15-14 on a block by Angelica Cornejo and Yesica Garcia.

With Carly Loucks serving, the Lasers went on a 5-0 run to take a commanding 20-14 lead. With Irvine Valley holding a 24-16 lead, the Dons made one final push by scoring three-straight points before losing 25-20.

The second game started the same as the first with neither team taking control as the teams played to a 10-10 tie. The Lasers broke the even play up by going on a 15-4 run to take the second game by a score of 25-14.

Keeping with the theme of the night, the two teams traded the lead early with the Dons holding the advantage at 12-9. The Lasers came back with four of the of the next five points to tie the game at 13-13. IVC broke the tie with six-straight points before going on to take the game, and the match by a score of 25-16.

IVC was led by Hillary Crone, who finished with 10 kills. Loucks added nine kills, Nichole May finished with 20 digs and Allie Hammer had 24 assists and six digs.

The Lasers, who are in a tie for first in conference with Orange Coast, host Golden West Friday night at 6 p.m. Golden West dropped out of the tie for first place after it was swept by Cypress on Wednesday.