Photo by Kloe Bryant – The Arcata Tigers defeated St. Bernard’s in four sets on Tuesday night.

With their conference opener just eight days away, the defending Big 5 champs continued their preparation with a victory over St. Bernard’s on Tuesday night.

The Arcata Tigers will begin conference play with a big showdown at Eureka on Thursday of next week, as two of the early favorites go head to head on opening night.

And the Arcata girls will carry some momentum into conference as they continue to enjoy a productive early season.

However, they had to battle against a St. Bernard’s team that came out ready to go on Tuesday.

The Crusaders took the opening set 25-19, but the Tigers would rally to win three straight sets — 26-24, 25-16, 25-21 — to take the victory.

With the win, Arcata improved to 7-4.

“We struggled a bit tonight with too many service errors,” Arcata head coach Laurie Griffith said. “But the girls turned it around and kept their attitudes up.”

Senior Nora Brumbaugh had a good night in the win and finished with team-highs in kills (eight) and digs (10), while Kyla Kinyon also impressed, adding six kills and five aces.

Griffith has been getting contributions from throughout her lineup and that continued to be the case against SB.

Pearl Smith added six kills and a pair of aces, while Colby Eisner had seven kills and Betty Miles had five.

Harper Appy rounded out a balanced team performance and helped set her teammates up for success with 32 assists.

Griffith also praised the contribution of the parent section for “being the seventh man” with their support.

No stats were immediately available for the Crusaders.