It may have not been on the football field, but the Battle of Murder Creek on the volleyball court took play Tuesday in East Brewton at W.S. Neal High School.
The two teams of W.S. Neal and T.R. Miller took to the court in a middle school, JV, and varsity volleyball and T.R. Miller came out on top in the series 2-1.
In middle school action, W.S. Neal rallied to defeat Brewton Middle School 2-1 while T.R. Miller claimed wins in the JV and varsity matches.
In the middle school games, W.S. Neal lost set one 25-18 but won set two 25-18 and set three 15-6 to take the early win.
In JV action, T.R. Miller claimed a 25-19 win in set one while W.S. Neal won set two 26-24. In the third and deciding match, T.R. Miller earned the win 15-8 to even the series at 1-1.
In varsity action, No. 10 T.R. Miller defeated W.S. Neal 3-0 in a tough, tension filled game. The Lady Tigers won set one 27-25, set two 26-24 and set three 25-19.
With the wins, W.S. Neal Middle School improved to 3-1 while T.R. Miller’s JV improved to 4-0 and the varsity team to 7-1.
After the losses Tuesday, Brewton Middle School fell to 1-1 while W.S. Neal’s JV team fell to 0-2 and the varsity team to 1-2.
T.R. Miller Lady Tiger head coach Greg White said he thought both teams played very hard.
“Those kids want to beat our kids and our kids want to beat their kids,” White said. “And that’s how it is supposed to be. It’s a good rivalry game and each team played hard to beat the other. I thought we played hard but I thought we executed poorly. We were very bad in serve-receive. We didn’t have very many good passes therefore we didn’t have very many sets and kills. We were also very inconsistent on the service line. Having said all of that, we still found a way to win three very close games over our rivals. That says a lot about our girls and the fact that we still played hard. I’m proud of them for that. We will get back to work and try to correct the things that need to be corrected.”
W.S. Neal Lady Eagle head coach Jeff said his girls play well against T.R. Miller.
“I am very proud of the way that all the W.S. Neal Lady Eagles played against T.R. Miller,” Haney said. “The middle school girls did a great job coming back and getting a victory. Our JV team fought hard and came up just a little short. This is a very young JV team when it comes to experience. They are still learning to play together as a team. As that improves, so does the outcome of their games.”
Haney said the varsity girls played hard all night.
“We were really excited coming into this game, and we are all disappointed with the outcome,” Haney said. “I am not disappointed about our play or our effort. We simply made some mistakes against a good team and they took advantage of them. I have to hand it to coach White and his team, they played hard and fought for the win. I think our serves were one key thing that hurt us a little. We had some trouble getting serves in during crucial points in the match. The offensive part of our game is improving with every practice. Our blockers did a great job tonight against some very good hitters. All we can do is keep working and these games will go our way.”
W.S. Neal’s varsity will be back in action Thursday at home in a tri-match with Jay and Escambia County.

WSNMS 2, BMS 1
After losing their first set to Brewton Tuesday night at home, the W.S. Neal Middle School Lady Eagles won sets two and three to defeat Brewton.
Brewton won set one 25-18 before W.S. Neal won set two 25-18 and set three 15-6.
In set one for W.S. Neal, Maddisen Bush and Karissa Johnson had three service point each while Alyssa English had two and Madison Winchester had one.
For Brewton, Morgan Manning had three points and one ace while Erin Wader had four points. Amelia Peach had one point and Raven Bryant and a kill. Mary Allison Peace had two points and Bridgett Casey had one. Lizzy Pollitte led with six service points.
In game two, Taylor Burns led W.S. Neal with six points while Johnson had four. English, Tiffany Robinson, Haleigh Dubose and Heather Martin all had one point each.
For Brewton, Manning and Pollitte had one point each while Wade and Casey had two each. Peach had one ace in the loss.
In game three, English had four points and Bush had six points to lead the Lady Eagles while Casey had two for Brewton and Bryant had one kill.

TRM JV 2, WSN 1
After splitting their first two sets Tuesday, T.R. Miller claimed the win with a win in the third set to down W.S. Neal.
In the first set, Ashley Fleming led W.S. Neal with five points and two aces while Abbi Roberts led T.R. Miller with eight straight points.
In set two, Tiffany Sawyer led the Lady Eagles with seven points, two aces and one kill while T.R. Miller was led by Krystal Bell with four points and two aces.
In set three, Fleming had one ace for W.S. Neal and Sawyer and Jasmine Crook had one point each.
For T.R. Miller, Madalyn Weaver had four points and one ace while Brittany Warren had three points and one ace.

TRM varsity 3, WSN 0
T.R. Miller’s varsity picked up a 3-0 win over W.S. Neal Tuesday to improve their record to 7-1.
In set one, W.S. Neal’s largest lead was five points while T.R. Miller’s was four. Set two saw the largest lead for W.S. Neal at four points while T.R. Miller’s was three. In set three, W.S. Neal led by as many as four while T.R. Miller’s final score of 25-19 was their largest lead at six.
For W.S. Neal in set one, Gracee Dixon led with five points and one kill while Taylor Guthrie led T.R. Miller with three points, one ace and one kill. Karisa Nelson had one ace and three total service points.
In set two, W.S. Neal was led by Dixon with four points and two aces while Guthrie led T.R. Miller with six kills and one block and Lauren Ward had five service points and one ace.
In set three, W.S. Neal was led by Ashlyn Lambeth and Lauren Boatwright with two points each while Karisa Nelson led T.R. Miller with four points and two aces.