Northside coach seeks to surpass notable volleyball season

In just her second year as the volleyball coach at Northside, Lindsay Johnson led her squad to a Class AAAAA state quarterfinal appearance last season, the deepest postseason run in the program's history.

The Lady Patriots also took perennial Area 1 power Columbus to five sets in the area championship match.

But don't try to sell Johnson on the season being a success.

"Last year was the best year in the history of the program," Johnson said. "But our kids' goal last year was to win it all. If you don't go for it all as a coach, and my players have finally realized, if you don't want to win it all, then what are doing this for every day.

"I would say overall it was a great season, but we didn't win our area and we didn't win state, so if you ask our players, I don't think they would say it was successful just because of what they wanted to accomplish. I think they may have learned some things last year as far as what we need to do this year."

Northside gets its season underway this afternoon when it hosts Veterans and Whitewater in a tri-match at 5 p.m. August 3 was the first day when matches are allowed by the Georgia High School Association, but most teams will get their season started this week.

The Lady Patriots will be without Ledger-Enquirer All-Bi-City Player of the Year Carly Smart, who signed with Valdosta State, as well as Lindsey Thomas, an All-Bi-City first-teamer, and Josie Burgos.

Northside will have four seniors on the squad in Kaitlyn Ellis, Caitlyn Jakes, Morganne Harper and Kendall Smith. Ellis and Jakes made the All-Bi-City first team, while Harper and Smith made the second team.

The Lady Patriots also get Katie Jordan back. She tore her ACL last season.

"It has been tremendously positive for our program to have her back because she is good," said Johnson, who was the coach at Shaw for four seasons prior to moving to Northside.

But Northside will also start a pair of sophomores, and Johnson is using three freshmen "a lot" as well.

"I expect to win, I expect us to play hard," Johnson said. "We go hard every day in the gym. Going hard has not been a problem at all this summer. We are young, but our senior leadership is great. The freshmen have already bought into the work ethic. Early, we may hit some bumps, but by October, we will be ready to go."

Kevin Price, Follow Kevin on Twitter @lesports

This story was originally published August 10, 2015 at 9:10 PM with the headline "Northside coach seeks to surpass notable volleyball season ."