BETHLEHEM — Getting off to a quick start can be a key to success.

This proved to be true in the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference volleyball quarterfinal on Saturday when Pleasant Valley traveled to Liberty.

The Bears got off to an early run in the opening set to take the lead. However, the Hurricanes stormed back in the second and third sets, grabbing large leads that PV was unable to recover from, and Liberty finished the job to grab a 3-1 victory.

Entering the month of October, league playoffs appeared to be a question mark for Pleasant Valley. From that point, the team proceeded to win four of its final five games to qualify as the sixth seed in the conference.

“The first part of the season, we struggled at times, and we just had to have that belief that we’re going to figure things out, we’re going to get it together,” Bears head coach Drew Dymond said.

“We have a lot of talent on our team. We just have to kind of admit that to ourselves that we have some confidence and we are a talented team. Once that starts to happen, then good things happen on the court.”

Considering that PV fell to Liberty 3-0 earlier in the season, the strategy was simple: be aggressive and don’t back down.

Initial results were positive.

The Bears used that aggressiveness to go on a 5-0 run and gain an early 14-8 advantage in the first set. Liberty fought back to tie the score at 17, but another 5-0 PV run propelled the visitors forward to take the opening set 25-21.

“Pleasant Valley had a great first set, and they came out and I thought they served us tough,” said Hurricanes’ head coach Fernando Torres. “We had a lot of serve reception errors, hitting errors or unforced errors. They came out of the gate and they were on fire, and our girls needed to be able to weather that and push through.”

Not only did Liberty weather the early storm, but it countered with a greater storm that overwhelmed the Bears in the second and third sets.

The Canes started working the ball over to Sofia Condoulis on the outside to finish off plays. Once the junior got on a hot streak, Pleasant Valley had no way of stopping her.

In set two, Liberty dominated with two separate 5-0 runs and a 6-0 stretch to win 25-12. Then in the following set, the Hurricanes used a 9-1 run to pull away early to remain a step ahead of the Bears. Despite PV pushing back, Liberty went on a 7-2 stretch to win the set 25-17 and take the match lead.

“We started the match up really aggressive,” Dymond said. “That was our game plan there. I thought, ‘Let’s go out and be aggressive and see what happens. We’re not going to beat a good team like this playing tentative.’ And I thought we came out that way.

“As the match went on, Liberty started to make some adjustments. They started to gain some confidence and we did struggle to kind of catch up at times.”

When set four got underway, it was clear that the Bears weren’t going to go down quietly.

PV stayed with the Hurricanes to a 15-15 tie, before Liberty finally managed to pull away to win the match with a 25-20 set four victory.

With where the team was earlier in the season, coach Dymond was impressed with how far along his team has come just to reach this point.

“We have grown since the last time we played against this team, so we knew we were going to have a better effort. I thought overall we did, but hats off to them. They were better today. We just have to have that confidence to go through and get ready for districts now.”

STANDOUT STARS ... Condoulis did most of the offensive damage for Liberty, amassing 28 kills. Mia Mitch was the primary playmaker totaling an impressive 41 assists, while team captain Eva Madeira kept numerous plays alive with 28 digs, including the 1,000th of her career. For Pleasant Valley, Kira Hnat stood out with 27 assists, setting up Sasha Slozina for 11 kills and Bella Slizewski with nine.

WHAT’S NEXT? ... The Bears will have over two weeks off before participating in the District 11 Class 5A semifinals, which will be hosted at Lehighton on Monday, Nov. 2. Liberty advances to the EPC semifinals on Tuesday at Northampton, where it will face Parkland.

Liberty 3, Pleasant Valley 1

Pleasant Valley 25 12 17 21

Liberty 21 25 25 25

Statistics: Pleasant Valley - Sasha Slozina 11 kills, 2 blocks; Bella Slizewski 9 kills, 2 aces, 3 blocks; Lila Borger 5 kills, 8 digs, 1 block; Kira Hnat 1 kill, 3 aces, 27 assists, 8 digs; Mya Williams 3 aces, 4 assists, 11 digs; Hunter Farkas 5 kills, 6 digs, 2 blocks; Harley Durant 3 kills, 4 blocks, 1 assist; Emmerson Deluna 1 ace, 5 digs, 1 assist; Macy Fette 2 digs, 1 assist; Liberty - Sofia Condoulis 28 kills, 2 aces, 8 digs; Mia Mitch 4 kills, 2 aces, 41 assists, 14 digs, 1 block; Eva Madeira 28 digs, 1 ace, 5 assists; Laila Torres 6 kills, 3 aces, 4 digs; Madison Spirk 5 aces, 13 digs; Laine Schnekel 5 kills, 1 ace, 1 dig, 3 blocks; Riley Corrigan 6 kills, Sophia Stuart 6 digs.

Records: Pleasant Valley (10-9; 10-7); Liberty (15-2; 15-2).