NEDERLAND — In the first installment of Mid-County Madness volleyball this season, Port Neches-Groves held off a furious fight from Nederand to win in five games 28-26, 24-26, 23-25, 25-16, 15-10 Tuesday night at the Dog Dome.

“It was not one of our best games,” PN-G head coach Barbara Comeaux said. “But, Nederland has something to do with that. They serve very tough and they took us out of our game. We didn’t play like we’ve been practicing. I have to give Nederland credit for that. We played a good team tonight. Every team in the district, we’re going to have to play and be ready.

“I’m really proud of the way our girls competed, though. They hung in there and won when we needed to.”

Every game except the fourth came down to the wire. That’s been par for the course for Nederland (16-7, 2-4 in 20-4A), as the Lady Bulldogs have played tough but haven’t gotten the victories to show for it.

“I’m really pleased with how the team played,” Nederland head coach Toni Leach said. “They fought and they fought hard. I think PN-G didn’t expect us to play as well as we did. We’ve been playing well against teams, we just haven’t been getting the breaks when we need them. They hustled and they were aggressive. They played with a lot of heart and fight tonight.”

It was the middle blocking and serving by Nederland that kept them in the match. Jaci Oliver and Kelsey Beard combined to collect 12 blocks between them and spearheaded Nederland’s comeback in Game 2 with them.

The Rock-A-Noos (25-5, 6-0) showed off powerful outside hitting, but Nederland’s defense played well, both in blocking them at the net and in digging out their hits to keep the point alive.

“You have to hand it to Nederland,” Comeaux said. “Everything we threw at them, they dug it up. We finally adjusted late. We have a lot of work to do.”

PN-G opened the match with a 28-26 victory. Neither team held more than a four-point lead in the game with nine ties and eight lead changes. Breanne Brown finished off the match with a hit into the middle of Nederland’s defense.

That’s when Nederland capitalized on some Rock-A-Noo mental mistakes, taking Games 2 and 3 with late rallies. With Game 2 tied at 22-22, the tandem of Oliver and Beard blocked three different PN-G hits for points to key the 26-24 edge. In Game 3, PN-G came on strong, taking 5-1 and 15-9 leads before Nederland rolled off an 16-8 streak of its own to take it 25-23.

PN-G was able to play like the District 20-4A leader that it is in Game 4, rolling off an 11-2 streak mid-game that gave them a 23-12 lead and all but assuring a Game 5. Ryanne Lunceford finished things off with a hard-hit, cross court kill.

In Game 5, the two teams traded leads again until it was tied 9-9. PN-G took a lead on another Lunceford kill and never trailed again, with the final point of the match coming when a Nederland hit went into the net.

Lauren Lovejoy led the Rock-A-Noos with 17 kills while Rickie Gilbert had 17 digs. Teammate Hannah Walker had four blocks while Hailey Zampini had 28 assists and Kameryn Scroggs had 17.

For Nederland, Felicia Sauceda had 35 assists and five service points. Kelsey Beard had 16 kills and five blocks while Jaci Oliver had nine kills and seven blocks. Kendall Ferguson added 13 kills and five digs while Destinie Jones had seven digs and Kinsey Miller had five.