St. Ambrose couldn't maintain another fast start, falling at Trinity Christian 20-25, 25-13, 25-21, 25-17 Tuesday night.

With 12 kills and five hitting errors in the opening set, the Bees hit .179 in taking the early lead. But over the final three sets, SAU collected 29 kills against 28 errors for a .009 hitting percentage.

St. Ambrose (9-16, 4-9 CCAC) led just 18-17 in the first set before three Troll errors over four points helped SAU establish a 21-18 lead. Kills from Sofia Pabon and Alexa Orozco opened up a 23-19 advantage. Kennedy DeBaillie closed things out with an ace three points later.

Emily Hickerson and Marta Barriguinha had kills to get the Bees off to a 4-1 lead in the second. An Olivia Johnson kill gave SAU its final lead at 8-7. Trinity Christian (10-14, 9-5 CCAC) won the next four points as part of a larger 7-1 run that put the Trolls in front 14-9. A six-point run minutes later allowed TCC to pull away to even the match.

The Bees trailed for the majority of the third set. St. Ambrose grabbed its first lead at 14-13 following back-to-back Trinity Christian hitting errors. But that was followed by a five-point Troll spurt. Two consecutive kills from Grace Beitzel helped SAU draw even at 20-20, but one more Beitzel kill was the only other Bee point as Trinity closed by winning five of the final six points.

Another big run - this one six points - put SAU in an 8-2 hole early in the fourth. The deficit grew to as many as 10 points at 14-4. St. Ambrose would get no closer than five points the rest of the way.

Beitzel finished with a team-best 11 kills. Barriguinha put own nine and Hickerson ended with five. Johnson, Pabon and Ines Marques each had four kills. Chloe Fabry added two.

Marques led the team with 27 assists and also picked up five digs. Orozco came up with 12 digs. Beitzel and DeBaillie matched Marques with five digs apiece. Pabon was credited with four digs and Rilee Talty was one of three Bees to register three digs.

The Bees will visit Judson Thursday.