Northside has only played three games in this young season, but is already experienced with playing close games. After a decisive, 84-51 loss to an experienced squad at First Flight, the Panthers have played their last two opponents closely.

The last one was a 69-63 overtime win at South Creek on Tuesday — their first win of the season. It’s been a valuable experience for the young team and they’ll hope to use it to one-up Washington Friday evening.

The two last played one another a week ago at Northside. The Pam Pack outscored the Panthers 19-6 in the second quarter for a 60-45 win. The other three quarters of the game were relatively even. Subtracting that lopsided period, Northside was only outscored 41-39.

“I think (Northside) will do the same things,” said Washington coach Steven Flowers. “That game was pretty close for most of the game. We were able to pull ahead and maintain that.”

Northside is continuing to find its identity after losing three of its top-five scorers. Senior Ikeem Greene averaged 10 points a game last season and has started coming into his own as an offensive leader this year. He dropped 31 points in the Panthers’ win over South Creek. Building on that effort will be key to Northside’s success on Friday and throughout the rest of the season.

The Pam Pack hopes to double up on Northside when they host the backend of this home-and-home series. Shaiquan Moore will be important to their offensive success, but he can’t be expected to bear as much of the scoring responsibility as he did last week. He leads the team with 16 points a game and scored 25 against Northside last week.

Junior Sharwan Staton has been taking on more offensive duties this season. He was second on the team with 7.4 points per game as a sophomore, but has been scoring a smidge beneath that mark so far this season. He only had four points last week at Northside and will be key in taking pressure off of Moore and spreading the court.

“We have a lot of new guys this year,” Flowers said. “We didn’t really know what we had. Now that we’ve played four or five games, we know what we have and where are strengths are on things like rebounding so we know who we need to have on the floor … They’re a little tougher than what we thought we had.”

Defensively, Washington will look to do more of the same. Northside shot just 29 percent from the field last time the two met. The Panthers took 25 of their 55 shots from behind the arc. They made just five of their long-range attempts.

“We were able to play and defend without fouling,” Flowers said. “If we can keep teams off the free-throw line, we’ve got a better chance of winning. We didn’t get whistled for a lot of fouls.”

Washington’s key focus on both ends will be rebounding. The Pam Pack will aim to do what they can to limit Northside’s opportunities. That comes down to defensive rebounding and not turning the ball over. Also, they have a better idea of what the Panthers will do defensively, so they know how to prepare in that regard.

“We’ve been working on rebounding. We’re trying to get better on the boards,” Flowers said. “We’re working on limiting turnovers and handling the press, too. Those are the big things … (Rebounding) is a lot better. You never really know until you get to a game, but, against each other, we’re getting after it. I think we’ve gotten better.”

Limiting turnovers has come down to a lot of work on fundamentals. Flowers said the team has been doing ball handling drills, passing drills and working on catching the ball with two hands.

“When you start to do live stuff, you’ve got to make sure you’re reinforcing that,” he said. “When you’re passing the ball, put two hands on it to catch it. Things like that.”

Tip off is scheduled for 7:30 p.m.