River Islands rode the hot hand of Milyn Morales to a 25-20 first-set victory over visiting Chavez on Thursday before the Titans rebounded to take the next three 23-25, 15-25, 16-25 for a 3-1 non-league girls volleyball win.

“We started out well,” Riptide coach Ellianna Ramirez said. “I feel that sometime they get in their heads.

“Kudos to Chavez, they did really well. And I am glad we took it to four sets. It was fun.”

Morales started the first set with three consecutive aces and started the second set with a pair of aces, but in the second set, the Riptide (0-10) fell victim to the ace, watching an 18-12 lead evaporate to a 19-18 deficit behind three aces from Chavez (1-9).

Morales finished with 16 digs, 10 kills and seven aces with three of those kills coming from the back row.

“I feel like my serving today was on point,” Morales said. “I was looking at areas that I thought would give me an opportunity to get an ace.

“On those back-row kills, I think I had a great setter in Brielle Hermano that set me up for success.”

Hermano finished with eight assists.

This was the first match that the Titans of Stockton had their entire squad together.

“After that first set we started playing like a team again,” Chavez coach George Conklin said. “One of our really good players has been out, and today was her first game back and we had to get the rhythm back, and once they got it they were ready to go.”

River Islands won the freshman contest 2-0 and lost the junior varsity tilt, 2-0.

The Riptide travels to Modesto tonight to face Grace Davis at 6:30.