Last Thursday, Sept. 11, Naperville North’s varsity girls volleyball team (4-4, 0-1 DVC) played their first home match of the season against the Batavia High School Bulldogs (4-6, 2-0 Upstate 8).

Despite a close loss in their first set, the Huskies won the next two games decisively, earning a 2-1 victory over Batavia. Head Coach Jennifer Urban found her team somewhat unfocused in their first set, but she was impressed by the rhythm they set for the remainder of the match.

“It was good to see us come back in game two and in game three,” Urban said. “We made quite a bit of errors, especially in that first stretch of the first game. It was good to see us change our level of emotion.”

The first game was a neck-in-neck battle between the two teams, resulting in a 25-23 Batavia victory. Simple mistakes were made early on NNHS’ part, allowing the Bulldogs to gain a 9-8 lead against the Lady Huskies. Batavia widened the point differential to 15-10 before the Huskie defense rebooted. NNHS scrambled to overcome the Bulldogs before the set was over. The score was tied at 19, 21 and 23, but Batavia held out and won the game.

In contrast, the second game saw full domination from NNHS. After the first 8 points had been scored, Batavia’s defense seemingly disintegrated under NNHS’ offensive pressure. Starting with a score of 4-4, the Lady Huskies scored eight consecutive points, securing a 12-4 lead against the Bulldogs. After allowing two points to be scored on them by the Bulldogs, the Lady Huskies went on another streak. This time, they scored 13 points, for the winning score of 25-6.

The third and final set saw a stronger display of Batavia’s defense, but again ended in a NNHS victory. The lead went back and forth until NNHS entered double digits and was able to create distance between Batavia and themselves. By setting up offensive opportunities and playing tenacious defense, the Huskies forced another 2-digit win against Batavia, with a score of 25-14.

Thursday night saw a number of impressive performances from the Huskies, including 29 digs from junior libero Emily Bushman, 29 assists from senior floor captain Emily Kwak, and 21 kills between seniors Jenna LaCorte and Megan Wernette.

Coming off a tough loss against St. Francis High School on Wednesday, the Lady Huskies were hungry last night for a win against Batavia. LaCorte spoke about what drove them to perform so well in the final two sets, and what this match meant to her personally.

“I think it was definitely that mental aspect,” LaCorte said. “Especially coming off of yesterday, I feel like for me, that was still in the back of my head. I wanted to come back on the court and prove that we could win against Batavia, a great team.”