The King’s Fork High School girls’ volleyball team, which featured five all-conference honorees this year, saw its season come to an end last week in the Conference 17 tournament semifinals against host Deep Creek High School.

The No. 2 Lady Hornets topped the No. 3 Lady Bulldogs 25-21, 25-16, 25-21.

“We started off kind of shaky, I guess a little bit of jitters,” King’s Fork coach Sarah Porter said.

She noted the Lady Bulldogs got it together later, but Deep Creek had gotten the jump on them, and the two other sets were rough due to injuries.

In the second set, junior defensive specialist Jordan Edler suffered a knee injury, and junior outside hitter Latoya Thomas suffered a shoulder injury.

Thomas later returned to the court, but she was having difficulty lifting her arm.

Porter said that Thomas makes a lot of big plays and is a motivator on the team, and the Lady Bulldogs missed her being at 100 percent on the court.

King’s Fork junior setter Cydney Nichols finished the match with 10 assists, four aces, two kills and a block, senior outside hitter Latonia Thomas registered six kills, four digs and two aces and freshman middle hitter Neecole Brown had four kills and two blocks.

The Lady Bulldogs ended up producing a 9-10 overall record this season, and they went 6-4 in the conference during the regular season.

“I feel like this conference was a little bit stronger than Conference 18 last year,” Porter said.

The season had its ups and downs, but she said the team met its general goal of improvement.

Five of them received All-Conference 17 recognition, led by Nichols, who was the lone first-team selection for the Lady Bulldogs.

“She received first team last year,” the coach said. “She put up better numbers this year than last year. Just about every game I get compliments from other coaches.”

Porter said that before the selection meeting even started, other coaches were asking her what Nichols’ name was because the junior setters’ strong reputation preceded her.

Porter said Nichols is the Lady Bulldogs’ setter because they need a setter, but she can pretty much fill any position on the court.

Playing in 65 sets over the course of the season, Nichols ended up with 204 assists, 79 kills on 130 attempts, a .474 attack percentage, 79 digs, seven blocks, 52 aces and a serving percentage of 86.

King’s Fork senior middle hitter Jazlyn Dunn made the all-conference second team, while Latonia Thomas, Latoya Thomas and senior defensive specialist/libero Kiana Boone received honorable mention.