SIS upsets Fotten Gaga

Every night of beachside action at the Pacific Islands Club is getting better and Thursday night saw the students from Saipan International School upset Fotten Gaga for their first win of the 8th Annual Miller Lite Coed Four-Person Volleyball League.

Led by teacher Rob Eply and leaper Melisa Halaby, the SIS Geckos survived an 11-4 loss in the opening set and rallied to foil Fotten Gaga’s attempt at building a winning streak to take the next two, 11-3 and 11-5.

The win was SIS’s first of the season but they are still in the playoff hunt as the fifth place team in the Yellow Division. The top four squads will battle the best quartet from the Blue Division following the close of the regular season’s schedule.

Fotten Gaga is also 1-2 but currently holds the final slot by virtue of winning more sets and allowing fewer points against three games into the season.

Dolphins-Blue Shiner also notched its first win but the students from Marianas High School did so by downing their classmates from Dolphins-Not Ashamed in a three-set sweep.

The Blue crew opened up with an 11-4 score in the first set and followed with an 11-8 win to clinch the victory in the second set before breaking out the brooms in the third, 11-6.

Both squads are 1-2 and have a shot in the playoff chase as well, which is more than the spirited bunch from SaipanCell can say as they lost for the third time in three attempts. James Lee and the mobile mavens lost to first place We’re All Going Streaking by a combined score of 33-11 to add to their division-high 88 points against.

Dale “Dread Pirate” Roberts and company smacked the Cells with an 11-6 loss in the first set and completed the sweep with a pair of one-sided sets, 11-2 and 11-3. At 3-0, We’re All Going Streaking is atop the league with a perfect record, 99 points for, and slim 31 points against, but their closest competitors are not far from their marks as Pulullun Part II is also undefeated through three games.

Thursday night saw the debut of the squad’s weak link, but the PPII crew persevered by taking two of three from E.J. Lee’s Battered Fish Sticks under the lights. Apple Samson and Ken Tanzawa were working together as one in taking the opening set 12-10, but Pulullun Part II fell apart in the second and surrendered the second, 11-1.

The weak link shook off some rust and delivered a streak of six straight serves to take a 7-1 lead, but Pulullun had to fight off a Lee’s comeback march to emerge with an 11-9 win in the rubber match.