WEST SPRINGFIELD — School vacation hurt the Belchertown boys volleyball when it visited winless West Springfield, Thursday.

The short-handed Orioles fell 25-18, 25-9, 25-19.

Belchertown dropped to 3-5. The Terriers snapped their six-game season-opening losing streak.

“We have some people missing, including our starting setter, because of vacation and a couple of other seniors,” Belchertown coach Scott Poulin said. “We had to put together what we could, hence the lineup change every game. We also had somebody forget their jersey so we didn’t have a backup libero.”

The Orioles had troubling mounting an attack in the first set. Communication issues prevented them from finding any sort of rhythm.

“When your setter is missing and other people are playing positions they are not used to, it’s hard for them to talk,” Poulin said. “They’re not sure where they need to be.”

Despite the issues, the set was tied at 9-9. The Orioles fought, but were overpowered by the athleticism of West Springfield, which scored most of its points off kills or Belchertown errors.

The second set was where the Orioles missed their starters the most. Belchertown trailed 16-2 before dropping the set 25-9.

“We got down by 13 or 14 and just kept watching the ball hit, watching the ball hit,” Poulin said. “Not talking or moving. It was not our best effort, we’ve definitely played better.”

Poulin understood the performance considering the circumstances.

“We’ve been trying to plan for this game, because we knew (starting setter Connor LaFlamme) was going to be gone,” Poulin said. “But we haven’t had any gym to practice in all week so it’s been kind of difficult.”

Sophomore Nate Courchesne played in and started his first varsity game in place of LaFlamme. He finished with seven assists.

“He did a good job,” Poulin said. “He made all of his serves, he was in the right position and that’s all I expected from him. The fact that he even got some assists with some kills I was really happy with.”

Nathan Bresnahan had two aces and two kills in defeat. Kyle Zielinski added four kills and Nathan Wright had two.

Poulin used Thursday’s game as a teaching point for his team.

“They’re a much better team than their record shows, they’ve just been playing the top competition,” he said. “It’s very similar to us. We’ve been playing Agawam, Central and Athol too, and we’ve been having losses in the fifth or we lose in three by two points, two points and three points.”

The Orioles are expected to be back at full strength when they play Sci-Tech at 5 p.m., Monday in Springfield.