BLOOMFIELD -- Once Dexter found control in its hitting, it took control of the match. Then Hannah Thurmon took control of the net.
Dexter rebounded from early mistakes to beat previously undefeated Bloomfield 18-25, 25-18, 25-20 Tuesday night.
"I hate to lose, but at least we fought. We didn't come out and let them pound us. It was a good loss because we fought hard, we played hard, and now we know what we have to work on. I'd rather take a loss now than later on," Bloomfield coach Haley Silman said.
Thurmon led the Lady Bearcats with a season-high 20 kills and added four blocks and five digs.
Half her kills were in the third set, where she also had a block.
The 6-foot senior put Dexter (9-4) ahead 12-9 in the third set and put down the Lady Bearcats' next seven kills to push ahead 21-15.
Blair Rogers added one of her four kills, and then Addie Kruse got a block and two kills to finish off the match between the Stoddard County Activities Association rivals.
"In my opinion, whoever plays defense and whoever is playing offense, the offense is usually in control of the game. Now if you can do both that's great," Dexter coach Carmen Morgan said. "I feel like we played more offense in the second and third game."
Kruse finished with eight kills and 3.5 blocks. Setter Bailee Williams had 30 assists and five kills for Dexter.
"She runs it out there and she does a great job. I felt like she kept things off-balance and that's what we want to do," Morgan said of Williams.
Dexter missed five serves and missed another four attacks either long or wide. It didn't help that Bloomfield (5-1) came out with aggressive hitting.
"You can't miss five serves against a good team. And you don't, in my opinion, deserve to win if you miss that many serves," Morgan said.
Neither team led by more than two points in the opening set until back-to-back Dexter returns landed wide to put the Lady Wildcats ahead 12-8.
Jewell Chism followed with an jump serve for an ace and Bailey Below added a kill for a six-point lead.
Dexter soon cut it to two, but another Lady Wildcat run that featured back-to-back aces from Lilly Warrick pushed the lead to seven.
Cayla Mayberry, who finished with eight kills, put one down to get to set point and Chism finished it with one of her team-leading 12 kills.
"We just made a lot of unforced errors. We wanted to clean those up, that was the message. Get the serves over and in, clean up the unforced errors, and we have to get on the net and get a touch on the block," Morgan said.
Both Bloomfield blocks came in that first set. Dexter also missed one serve each in the second and third sets.
"Our block was a little late, so we just need to work on our blocking and moving on our defense. They just kind of got in their heads. They get blocked or they get picked up a couple times and they feel like they have to start tipping or whatever," Silman said. "We let back a little on our hitting, but we are going to work on that."
Dexter never trailed in the second set and was tied with Bloomfield just once, at 1. It was still close midway through, but then the Lady Wildcats hit four straight attacks out of bounds and were suddenly down 17-11.
Bloomfield cut it to three points late, but Dexter scored the final four points on a Lady Wildcat error, points from Thurmon and Williams, and a tip to win the set by Rogers.
"We just let down on our hitting. Dexter has some great hitters and we just kind of stood and watched them hit at us," Silman said.
Nicole Roper had 29 assists and 10 digs for Bloomfield. Below had nine kills and seven digs.
"We knew this was going to be a battle here. We played them back in December, but December is always a completely different thing. We knew we had to come and now we know where we are," Silman said. "We've got some work to do, but I'm happy with what I'm seeing. We are progressing every game. We are going the little things right, so now if we can do the big things right we'll be where we need to be."