Mirror photo by Matt Michelone Central coach Ken Streilein (left with hat) talks to his Scarlet Dragons during a timeout.

MARTINSBURG — Beating a team three times in a volleyball season is one of the hardest things to do in the sport.

During the regular season, Central and DuBois met three times during the boys volleyball regular season with the Beavers sweeping the first match with the Dragons taking the last two — in a sweep and five sets, respectively.

The Beavers started strong, taking the opening set thanks to two big runs.

But late in that first set, the Dragons started settling in, and sparked in part by two senior players who didn’t start playing volleyball until recently, and they never looked back.

Powered by three critical kills in set three by Hayden Smith and a couple of key finishes late in the fourth by Braydon Gregg, the second-seeded Dragons knocked off No. 3 DuBois 20-25, 25-15, 25-23, 25-22, in the District 6-9 Class 2A semifinal at Central High School.

It’s amazing how far they’ve come,” Central coach Ken Streilein said. “They are playing like really seasoned veterans. They’ll make an error once in a while, and they just shake it off. They’re one of the big differences because teams can’t just focus on Christian (Heuston) and Bryson (Brooks). They have to respect our middles.”

That sets up a date with top-seed and undefeated West Shamokin on May 28 at Johnstown High School’s Doc Stofko Gymnasium in the championship at 7 p.m.

“I knew it was going to be a battle tonight,” DuBois coach Dave Alberts said. “We had a situation where one of our starting outside hitters told us right before the match he couldn’t play.

“I give the guys a lot of credit because we had to make a lot of changes to the lineup, a lot of subbing in and out during the match where people were playing different positions and they battled. It was a really good battle.”

The Beavers took the early advantage first on a 10-4 run that was powered by a kill and block by Ethan Rusnica which helped build a 16-10 lead.

The Dragons rallied back to pull within one in the first, but Rusnica added two additional finishes before a plethora of attack errors on both ends led to the Beavers lone set win.

“I could tell that we were nervous,” Streilein said. “A lot of guys haven’t been in this big of a game before. We were a little nervous, and then we’d make a couple of good plays, and then we would just get those nerves again. Once we got through the first set and we settled down a little bit, I really thought we were OK.”

In the third set,Central pulled ahead late as Smith came up with his finishes, and Heuston finished off set three to give the Dragons the lead for good.

“Serve-receive has been our nemesis all year,” Alberts said. “When our serve-receive is doing well, we were fine. Our offense was running and click. When it’s not running smooth, our offense isn’t running. I think that led to a lot of the other errors.”

Streilein is looking forward to the Dragons getting their shot at redemption against a Wolves squad that swept them in the prior two matchups this season.

“We’ve been looking forward to this all year long,” he said. We’ve been building for it. We’re still working on some new things that we’re hoping that we can just squeeze out a couple points.

“The last match we played them in the first two sets we lost by two. If we would’ve had just two points the other in both sets, we would’ve been up two.”

Game notes: Brooks had 14 kills and four blocks, Heuston had 16 kills, Smith had five kills and nine blocks, Logan Hummel had 41 assists, and Blake Reynolds had 18 digs.

SERVICE POINTS

CENTRAL: Reynolds-16, Hummel-14, Brooks-11, Heuston-3, Aungst-1, Grace-1

Records: DuBois (5-6); Central (9-6).