RAPID CITY - A little hiccup couldn't keep the Stevens Raiders from winning their first round District 4AA volleyball match on Tuesday against the Spearfish Spartans.

The Raiders once again showed why they have been the class of the West River Class AA volleyball teams with a 25-11, 25-15, 15-25, 25-9 win over the Spartans at Carold Heier Gymnasium. The win sets up a third match this season against Rapid City Central on Tuesday, this time for the District 4AA championship.

"We just went out and had fun," Stevens senior Whitney Lutz said. "Sometimes we forget that that's the main reason that we play. Just relaxing and having fun was what did it for us today."

Stevens took control of the first two games of the match fairly easily as they clicked in almost all facets. But with a chance to close the match out in three games the Raiders lost a little composure, something their coach has seen before.

"Sometimes, I think we try a little too hard," Stevens head coach Josh Lien said. "Sometimes, we want that victory, we want the fireworks to go off and to look good and we end up with too much effort and not enough execution."

The Spartans' serving had a little to do with that as well, as Spearfish's Abby Albers and Tessa Aiken started pounding serves into places that were tough for the Raiders to deal with.

"That's the team that I've seen quite a bit of this year," Spearfish head coach Sarah Dittman said. "And hopefully we can bring that team into practice tomorrow and get ready to play Sturgis on Tuesday."

The Spartans will get one last chance to show that they can play with that kind of spirit for an entire match when they will head to Sturgis to take on the Scoopers in the District 4AA third-place match. The winner of that contest will take on the District 3AA runner-up, while the loser's season will be over.

"There will be a little more pressure on us, sure," Dittman said. "But we need to concentrate on the positive. I've seen a lot of improvement. As the year has gone on we've

definitely progressed and got better."

Stevens knows that it will need to get a little better in games to close teams out as the playoffs move on.

"We're a little concerned with how we're going to fix that because that's the second game in a row that we've had a lapse in that third game," Lien said. "We did the same thing in our last game against Sturgis. It wasn't so much a concern for us tonight in that I thought we were going to go out and lose this match, but it is something that we're going to have to figure out in the future."

The Raiders (25-10 in all games) will play Central on Tuesday at 7 p.m. The Raiders have beaten the Cobblers twice this season.

"It's always fun to play your cross-town rival," Lutz said. "They're a good team. It's going to be fun to see whose improved more since the last time we played."

Spearfish will play at Sturgis at 7 p.m. on Tuesday. The Scoopers have beaten the Spartans twice this season in best-of-five matches while the Spartans knocked off the Scoopers in a best-of-three match at the Belle Fourche Invite.