The problem for Catholic High volleyball Tuesday wasn’t a lack of effort or a lack of getting to the ball.

It was more fundamental — a lack of quality serves.

Serve errors for the Lady Panthers were the big difference as Catholic High, which had been on a four game winning streak, dropped a straight-set decision to St. Thomas More, the defending Division II state champions, 22-25, 23-25, 21-25 in a non-district contest.

“We had too many service errors,” said CHS coach Jessica Frederick, who team fell to 7-3 on the season. “I think that’s what cost us.”

The CHS coach said her team had about three or four service errors in both the first and second games. The Lady Panthers lost the first game by three points and the second by two points.

“It was the same thing in the third game,” Frederick added. “I couldn’t tell you how many we had in the final game but it was enough when you lose by four points.”

The battle between the two reigning state champions — CHS won the Division IV crown in 2010 — was a close contest that saw STM jump ahead only to have Catholic High rally to pull within a few points at the end. The Lady Panthers just didn’t have enough to pull out a win in the end.

“It’s always good to beat a defending state champion,” said STM (11-2) coach Jessica Burke. “Catholic High has a good team.”

Burke said that for her team, the ability to get to the side out played a factor in the game. She also had the ability to move her offense around which allowed the Lady Cougars to place some of their shots where Catholic High couldn’t reach them.

Several times, St. Thomas More was able to get little dinks to fall just over the outstretched hands of CHS defenders.

But each time STM took a big lead, Catholic High stormed back.

“It all came to focus issues,” said Frederick. “Our serve is the only thing we have total control over and it was service errors that ended up costing us the game.

“We’ve got to let this game go but we have to focus on serving, especially when you play a team like St. Thomas More. And we have to make sure that if a team gets ahead of us by one or two points, it’s not the end of the world. We have to keep going and get back into the game.”

Jolena Broussard led CHS with eight kills. Sydney Lahasky had four aces, two kills, 20 assists and 16 digs; Vaterra Calais had five kills; Taylor Lahaskly added three kills, 13 digs , an ace and three blocks; and Katelyn Freyou had three blocks and a kill.

Catholic High plays host to Delcambre today.