A day after losing a close match, 3-2, against Southside, Washington was handled at home by another local 1-A rival in Northside. The Lady Panthers dominated their hosts in the first, second and fourth sets.

The two sides were knotted at six apiece early in the first set when Northside scored seven points in a row. The Lady Panthers used strong serves from Meredith Boyd, who had a few aces during the run, and solid hitting. Rachel Lang’s kill punctuated a 25-10 win in the first set for the visitors.

“We’re working on our serve-receive. That was probably one of our weaker things. They’re just getting in the flow of the game and keeping the rotation the same,” Northside coach Michelle Leathers said. A firm rotation was something she wanted to focus on after last week’s loss to a talented Riverside team.

“Everybody knows their job. I’ve got my people that come in for the back row. We worked on that. And we don’t look like we have cement in our shoes anymore.”

The second set didn’t go much better for the homestanding Lady Pack. Lang’s serving and blocking up front helped Northside open up the set with a 12-2 lead. Washington would notch just four more points before losing the set, 25-6, to fall behind 2-0 in the match.

The Lady Pack became increasingly silent on the court as its deficit grew larger. Coach Kendall Hihn highlighted that as one of the reasons Washington fell apart in the first two sets.

“We need communication and we need to move our feet,” she said. “We’ve had two days in a row and, at one point in each game, there was a hit and the five other girls on the court stand and watch. Before it hits the ground, they decide to move. So, we’ve got to work on our movement and our communication.”

Leathers added, “If you’ve got somebody down, go ahead and put them away. They started relaxing. We weren’t receiving the ball well. A couple of times, (Washington) was just serving the ball well. You’ve got to give credit where it’s due.”

Washington proved it can hang with the visiting Lady Panthers in the third set. Briley Waters’ ace gave her side an 8-4 lead early on. Northside kept the set close and even tied things at 14-14, but Washington was able to create some separation. Charity Gardner’s serving helped her team manufacture a 21-14 lead.

The Lady Panthers didn’t go away, though. They stormed back to tie the set at 23-23 before Washington closed them out to stave off a loss in the match.

Northside quickly built a 10-4 lead in the fourth set and never looked back. Lang’s serves helped fuel the early lead and, later, her hitting helped finish the Lady Pack off. The Lady Panthers, leading 24-9, needed just one point to win the match. Washington scraped together five consecutive points before Madison Tetterton’s earned Northside the victory.

The win showed plenty signs of improvement for Northside. While it highlighted some shortcomings for Washington, Hihn is confident that those are problems that can be addressed in practice. They haven’t had much time to practice recently, so the hope is that will help the team be in the form it was during the third set.

“We hadn’t had a practice since we played last Wednesday,” she said. The Lady Pack played last Wednesday, Thursday and then took the weekend off. “We haven’t had a chance to reconvene and practice. … I haven’t been here for a practice, either.”