On one hand, Tuesday’s loss to Pearl River showed the improvement of Franklinton’s first-year volleyball program, but on the other, it was frustrating for the Lady Demons.

Franklinton played much better than it did in the first meeting with Pearl River, falling 25-14, 25-17, 20-25, 25-13.

The bad part for Franklinton was that it wanted to do much better Tuesday after nearly erasing a two-game deficit before falling to St. Katherine Drexel, 25-12, 25-15, 18-25, 15-25, 15-9, the day before.

FHS was swept by Pearl River the first time the two teams met, 25-7, 25-14, 25-11, in match played Sept. 4.

“Was it a better performance from the last game we played (them)? Yes, but not from yesterday,” FHS coach Leslie McGhee said. “The team we played yesterday was a lot stronger than this team, and we played to that level. Yesterday, we lost two matches and we came back and won the third and fourth set and lost the fifth. Today, when we got behind, that was it. When we won that third set, it was because we were ahead the whole time. All of the other sets, we were behind. We got behind on ourselves, and we just couldn’t pick it up.”

In Tuesday’s match, Pearl River jumped out to a 3-1 opening game lead, but Franklinton responded with two straight points. Hailey Sellers downed a kill and broke Pearl River’s serve.

Sellers was aggressive throughout. She had several kills and also blocked some shots, which led to points for Franklinton.

“That was new,” Sellers said. “I haven’t got a lot of blocks in our past games, so it pretty much a surprise to me every time I went up. But I’m glad I was more aggressive.”

The game was close through about the halfway mark, but the Lady Rebels took control. Pearl River’s Abby Mayfield recorded a kill, which put PRHS up 13-12 and began an 11-0 run, which made it 23-12.

Franklinton held off game point twice, but the Lady Rebels ended up winning 25-14.

The Lady Demons hung in early on in the second game and trailed 7-6 after Sellers posted a kill.

Pearl River then scored three straight for a 10-6 advantage before FHS responded with two in a row, capped off by Kelsey Lewis’ ace.

The Lady Rebels continued to lead by two at 11-9 when they ran off five straight.

Sellers blocked a shot to end the run. FHS trimmed it to five with another point.

Pearl River’s lead was between four and six points, but when up 20-15 the Lady Rebels scored four in a row to get to game point.

FHS once again held the Lady Rebels off twice with a point from Jordan Ignacek and a Lewis ace. Pearl River then tallied the final point and was up by two games.

Franklinton got out to a confortable lead in the third game, going up 12-5.

Pearl River trimmed the lead to one a few times at 15-14, 19-18, 20-19 and 21-20, but the Lady Demons never looked back. With the score 21-20, FHS broke serve and then Sellers served three consecutive aces to pull her team within a game on a 25-20 victory.

Franklinton scored the opening point of the fourth game.

Neither team’s lead was bigger than two in the early going, but up 7-6, Pearl River began to widen the gap.

The Lady Rebels scored five straight and led 12-6.

Franklinton made it 12-7. After the clubs exchanged points, PRHS put up four straight and then cruised to the 25-13 victory.

Franklinton is back in action Monday, hosting Pine.