The rematch went to the defending champions, with the Greenwood volleyball team outlasting South Warren 3-1 (25-21, 25-20, 21-25, 25-20) on Thursday at South Warren High School.

Greenwood (12-1 overall, 4-0 District 14), which beat the Spartans for the Region 4 title last season, used a balanced attack at the net to remain unbeaten in District 14 play.

It was the Lady Gators’ first win at South Warren since 2012.

“We’ve really been working hard as a team and we’ve been really focusing on ‘How bad do you want it this year,’ ” Lady Gators sophomore hitter Annee Lasley said. “I think we came out here and worked together. It’s pretty big because we haven’t won (here) in a while.”

The Lady Gators jumped out to a 2-0 lead, steadily pulling away midway through set one and using a late 5-0 surge in the second set to take control.

South Warren (3-3, 2-2) came roaring back in set three.

The Spartans used a 7-0 run to take a 17-7 advantage. Greenwood tried to rally, closing to 23-20, but South Warren took advantage of a hitting error on a long rally and then got a kill from Ashtyn Vandiver to force a fourth set.

The Lady Gators rushed out to a 7-1 lead in game three before South Warren rallied to take a 10-9 advantage. An Alexa Davis kill and Jonaea Blissett block helped Greenwood regain a 14-11 advantage that it would never relinquish.

“We knew that South was going to present a lot of challenges,” Greenwood coach Jason Reels said. “We know them well. They know us well. We’ve played each other a lot. It’s an emotional place to play for us. It was good to get those first two sets, but we kind of let up a little bit. I think we thought we had them. Like I always tell the girls, ‘Championship teams never fold.’ You have to make sure to continue to pressure them.

“This win at South means a lot to us. It means a lot to our program.”

Alexa Davis led the Lady Gators with 16 kills. Lasley and Emmie Bender had 10 kills each, Katie Howard added eight kills and Rileigh Stivers finished with 48 assists.

“It’s pretty great (to have this balance) because you can trust everybody,” Lasley said. “You can trust them to put the ball down … and trust that they are going to make the play.”

Sophie Pemberton led South Warren with 13 kills. Vandiver added nine kills, while Hannah Yonts finished with eight kills.

“I think we put a lot of pressure on their serving and kind of kept them out of their system some,” South Warren coach Justin Griffin said. “We had some kids that stepped up and raised their level of play. Hopefully we can take a lot of good positives out of this and keep moving forward and keep building momentum.”

Greenwood will host Monroe County at 7:30 p.m. Monday. South Warren will head to Huntsville (Ala.) for the Ironman Volleyball Classic on Friday.{&end}