PINETOWN — Northside kept rolling Wednesday evening in a 12-0, five-inning win over rival Southside. The win extends the Lady Panthers’ streak to eight in a row ahead of their first-place showdown with East Carteret on Friday.

Pitching kept the visiting Lady Seahawks off balance throughout the contest and the defense made the routine plays necessary for the no hitter. Meanwhile, the offense turned in a dozen runs — the first six of which came with two outs.

After Southside went three up, three down in the top of the first, the visitors responded with a strong defensive effort by retiring two of the first three batters to take the plate. With two outs and Whitney Cromwell on second, Kendall Alligood dinked the ball right inside the left-field line to plate the first run.

Northside added three more two-out runs to take a 4-0 lead after one frame. Tiffany Oliver batted in Alligood and Quortasia Clark with a base hit over the Southside first baseman. Oliver later came across on Mariah Stanley’s single to centerfield.

“That says a great deal about the team,” Northside coach Riley Youmans said. “We never give up. We’ve been down in several games this year and come back.”

“We’d have two outs and just make a couple of errors,” Southside coach Milton Ruffin said. “We just couldn’t get out of the inning without giving up runs.”

Southside sent just four to the plate in the second inning. Danielle Ruffin and Maggie Craig were retired consecutively to start the inning. Gloria Valdez drew a walk, but was stranded when Kimmy Ange struck out.

Northside’s resolve was on full display again in the bottom of the inning. Savannah Slade led off with a double and moved into scoring position on Mackensi Swain’s groundout to third.

The Lady Panthers added another pair of two-out runs when Rachel Lang’s single through the left side plated Slade. Teagan Pilgreen, running for Lang, scored soon after on Clark’s shot to no man’s land in shallow right field.

Southside only sent 10 batters out over the course of the next three innings while the hosts added on to their lead. Swain put three more on the board in the third with a shot over the left-field fence that also scored Slade and Stanley.

With a 9-0 lead, the Lady Panthers sent Rebekah Williams out to pitch the final two frames. She fanned two of the seven batters she faced.

Oliver led off the fifth with a base hit and Williams’ double put two Lady Panthers in scoring position. They scored three runs on consecutive extra-base hits from Slade and Swain, earning the 12-0 lead that would stand up as the final score.