Bethlehem Academy Sweeps Defending State Champion Buccaneers

The Faribault Bethlehem Academy Cardinals appeared to thoroughly enjoy themselves in Waterville on Thursday night in a 25-20, 25-20, 25-13 victory over Waterville-Elysian-Morristown.

The defending state champion Buccaneers were 10-0 heading into the match while the Cardinals were 5-4 and coming off a shaky outing against Waconia earlier in the week.

The first set started like the match I anticipated: highly competitive and a see-saw affair.

This match featured two true high school volleyball superstars in seniors Payton Nutter for Bethlehem Academy and Kate Masberg for Waterville-Elysian-Morristown.

Masberg recorded her 1,000th kill in a Tuesday win over Tri-City United and was very close to picking up her 1,000th dig to go along with her 1,000th set assist.

Nutter has that rare accomplishment under her belt also and the first set was a Nutter and Masberg display of their skills.

The Cardinals had just a few more weapons to go with their versatile star. In particular, junior Mary Campbell was lights-out good with double-digit kills and four service aces on the night.

In the second set, Bethlehem Academy jumped out to a 7-1 lead and never trailed, although Waterville-Elysian-Morristown made it interesting when the score was 19-17.

The Cardinals also jumped out to a big lead in the third set and put the pedal to the metal in the easy 25-13 win.

I could have literally named all the Bethlehem Academy players our State Farm Faribault Players of the Match courtesy of Jason Krohn and Tony Langerud. We settled on Nutter with 16 kills and three ace serves, Campbell with 10 kills and four ace serves, Delaney Donahue, Shelby Meyer and Olivia Nass.

Five-foot-10-inch sophomore Jacie Jasinski saw her first significant time at the net in varsity play and looked comfortable in her new role, and 6-foot-1 junior Maggie Beckmann fulfilled her role nicely, too, putting up a very good block.

Libero Keely Skluzacek handled enough Masberg smokers to see the Bucs try to find other scorers during the match.

Masberg told me after the match the Cardinals were simply, "too good at shooting around the block." Or over it. Repeatedly Nutter would take a pass or ball that careened to her and quickly push the ball over the block to an empty corner for a point.

Last year the Bucs traveled to Bethlehem Academy and were throttled during the regular season only to defeat the Cardinals in the state title match in a five-set thriller.

Waterville-Elysian-Morristown head coach Crystal Lamont points to that regular season match as the start of a very special season.

Masberg says her team once again needs to use the match as a learning experience and said they "played much better" than the match at Van Orsow last season.