CLAREMONT — The Claremont boys volleyball team is seeking its first league title since 2018 but nearly let that opportunity slip away Monday.

The Wolfpack, however, recovered in the fifth set for a 25-10, 25-17, 16-25, 22-25, 15-10 Baseline League victory over Rancho Cucamonga.

The victory moved Claremont (21-9 overall, 8-3 in league) into a three-way tie for first with Upland and Chino Hills. Each team has one match remaining. Rancho Cucamonga (18-12, 5-6) dropped into fifth place, one game behind Etiwanda for the league’s fourth and final automatic playoff spot.

“Set five, we were like, ‘let’s be us and let’s get after it,’” Claremont coach Bernie Wendling said. “Rancho made a couple of mistakes. That was enough to fuel us to get big leads (in the (fifth set).

“For us, it’s learning to play playoff (volleyball). It wasn’t pretty (Monday); it wasn’t our best. But you win and you move on.”

Rancho Cucamonga had all the momentum entering the fifth set and even scored the first two points of the frame.

But then Claremont got rolling, scoring seven straight points to take a 7-2 lead and later extended the advantage to 12-6.

“We got a little more matchups that we liked,” Wendling said of the fifth set. “We were able to get Travis (Anderson) going a little bit more.”

In fact it was Anderson who had the kill on match point.

“I’m proud of the response,” Cougars coach Jodi Postlmayr said of the third and fourth sets. “We started slow, we weren’t playing our best and the fact that we responded and didn’t roll over and got tougher as the match went on. It’s hopefully showing to CIF that we are a playoff team.”

The Cougars didn’t look like it early. They looked timid at the net, offensively and defensively. Claremont scored seven straight points on Jaden Cardenas’ serve to take a 15-5 lead and was never threatened the rest of the way.

In the second set it was a 6-1 run by the Wolfpack to take a 20-14 lead that did in the Cougars.

The third and fourth sets were a different story. Rancho Cucamonga took the lead early in the third and never gave it up,

The fourth set was tight and tied at 22-22 before the Cougars got the next two points from Samuel Son and Gavin Chen and a Claremont error gave the second set to Rancho Cucamonga.

“In the third and fourth sets I think we gave in to the energy of them just being ahead,” said Claremont senior setter Jaime Villalvazo, who had 41 assists. “We let them take control. In the fifth set, we got a lead (and) used that for our energy. We had our bench lift us up and used it to move forward.”

Alex Hoffmeister led Claremont with 14 kills. Anderson had 12 kills and hit at a .388 clip, while Joe Chavez added nine kills.

Claremont closes the regular season at home Wednesday night against Los Osos.