The first-round jinx is finally over for the Northside Lady Bears volleyball team.

After falling in the opening round each of the past three seasons, the Lady Bears finally got that elusive first-round win in the 6A state tournament at Cabot. They pulled out a five-set win against Rogers on Tuesday, prevailing 25-21, 21-25, 25-12, 23-25, 15-12.

Northside (19-12-1) will now advance to Wednesday’s 6A quarterfinals in Cabot. The Lady Bears take on Bentonville at 1 p.m.

In the decisive fifth set, Northside rallied from an 8-6 deficit before Rogers tied the score at 11-all. Then, Northside went on a 4-1 run to close things out, capped by a kill from Nicole Medlin, who finished the day with nine kills and seven blocks.

Senior Quineisha Tillery had 10 kills, fellow senior Taylor Pate had 28 digs and six aces and Lexie Mosby, another senior, had 22 assists, five digs and three aces.

Grace Anne Hollenbeck and Lainey Logsdon had six and five kills, respectively, and Sydney Klein had five kills and one block. Also for the Lady Bears, Macie Grams had 17 assists and seven digs, Thea Bishop seven digs and three aces, Hannah Smith nine digs and Dynasty Andrews three kills.

Andrews had a big block in the opening set to tie the score at 20-all; then Tillery had a kill on the next point as Northside erased a 19-15 deficit to eventually take a 22-20 lead. In the third set, Northside built a 12-6 lead on a Tillery kill before stretching it to 14-7.
