The Wildcats overcame a number of unforced errors and a few questionable calls by the referees to defeat Everett 25-21, 25-20 and 25-22 in Thursday evening volleyball action.

The victory puts Oak Harbor

on top of the WesCo North with a

4-0 league record and an 8-1 overall mark.

The unforced error bugaboo struck the Wildcats early in the first game as the visiting Seagulls took an early 4-0 lead.

However, kills by Jennifer Jansen and strong serving by Jessica Muzzall put the Wildcats on top 11-7 and the game appeared to be in hand — but only for a moment.

Unforced errors got Everett right back into the game until senior Clair Thiel recorded three-straight kills to put Oak Harbor back in the lead to stay.

“Unforced errors, that’s the name of this game and working to eliminate them,” coach Kerri Molitor said.

In the second game, Oak Harbor held an early 4-1 lead but the Seagulls came fighting back to tie the score 4-4 and again at 8-8.

Once again, a Thiel kill got the Wildcats the lead and the ball, and she followed with four more points on serve to put the Wildcats in the lead for good.

“We played extremely well tonight, it was awesome,” Thiel said. “There was so much intensity and it was like pumped.”

In the third game Oak Harbor’s other big front line player, Jansen, took things over and the Wildcats cruised to a 25-22 win to secure the victory.

“We worked hard and the refs were bad, but we were able to work through it,” she said. “Practicing yesterday on breaking the

chain, stopping a big run of cosecutive points, helped us a lot.”

Jansen had 12 kills and two blocks for the Wildcats and Thiel had eight kills, three block and a pair of serving aces.

Becca Wheeler had 28 assists and four kills, and Kellie Newton had 17 digs.

Janay Baeyen had seven digs and Muzzall had seven kills.

“The kids applied what we were practicing yesterday and I’m proud of them for that,” Molitor said.