Stella Tai is an ASU Cronkite School of Journalism student assigned to cover Camelback High School for AZPreps365.com

Despite dropping the first set, North's strong offensive production helped the Mustangs turn the table, fending off home team Camelback on Tuesday in four sets, 17-25, 25-10, 25-16, 25-23.

After a slow 0-4 start in the opening set, the Spartans found their groove by capitalizing on several Mustangs errors. A 9-2 run by Camelback prompted a timeout from North coach Mindy Williams.

Camelback came back and continued to show resilience that later resulted in a 9-4 run and a 25-17 victory. The Spartans never relinquished the lead during that span.

The Mustangs committed 13 errors in the first set.

The situation reversed in the second set as North switched up its game plan by putting its original lineup back on the court. Down 0-2, the Mustangs took over with an 8-0 scoring run that featured two kills, one block and one ace.

“I just tried different girls in different positions,” Williams said. “But obviously that didn't work so we had to go back and the girls had to work harder to fight.”

North built its largest lead of the night, 25-10, with a set-point kill by senior setter Joselyn Rangel.

In the third set Camelback reinforced its defense resulting from the combined six blocks by two senior middle hitters Leah Luevanos and Paris Anderson, giving the Spartans a 7-5 lead. However, four ensuing attacking errors swung the momentum back into North’s favor, which reeled off a 6-0 run and put the set away, 24-16.

“We started off really strong,” Camelback coach Cailinanne Johnson said. “It's just we slowed down, we got in our heads, and then it's just mistake after mistake on our side.”

When straight kills from North went unanswered starting off the fourth set, the result of the match seemed to be determined early. However, Camelback mounted a major rally from trailing 8-17 to even the match at 20-20, mainly due to the aggressive play of Luevanos, who racked up five kills and a block in the final set.

“It was really hard because usually I play mid on the team and it's easy to get around the block but with outside it's completely different,” Luevanos said. “But North hitters had good offense, so I could block them. I felt really good, but overall I feel like I could have been 10 times better.”

Luevanos tacked on two consecutive kills to help the Spartans regain the lead 23-21.

With two more points needed to send the match to a fifth set, Camelback’s momentum was disturbed by a controversial call, which stopped the game for five minutes.  

“The down ref is the one who's supposed to make calls on who netted,” Johnson said. “He agreed with me that the other team netted before we did. So it should have been our point. But the upper ref challenged him, which he shouldn't have done. He didn't have the angle on it.” 

Eventually, that play was ruled a jump ball, but the Spartans had not put any points up the board since the call. The Mustangs pulled away with a 25-23 win.

Johnson was not satisfied with the call, considering it “ridiculous and game-changing.”

“Our middle went down because of a violation on the other team, but the ref didn't call it and that was ridiculous in my mind,” she said. “And that really slowed us down. We had so much momentum into that point. And then that one thing caused us to kind of just fall apart on those last two points.”

The Spartans remain winless in their five home games, while the Mustangs won eight of their last nine matches.

Camelback will be on the road to face Maryvale at 6 p.m. Thursday. North has another road game Wednesday at 6 p.m. against San Luis High School.