The Faribault Bethlehem Academy Cardinals swept Wadena-Deer Creek Saturday to finish third at the Class A MSHSL State Volleyball Tournament.

Scores were 25-23, 25-20, 25-14 at the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul.

The victory came less than 24 hours after the Cardinals were swept by Minneota in the semi-finals.

Senior Mary Campbell finished her career at Bethlehem Academy with a 22 kill performance and had an attack percentage of .354 in the match.

Campbell was named to the Class A All-Tournament team.

The Cardinals hit .209 has a team while the Wolverines had a team attack percentage of .078.

The attack percentages by set for BA were .170, .250, .220 with 16, 15 and 14 kills respectively.

Wadena-Deer Creek hit .244, .059, -.108 with 15, 9, and 6 kills.

The energy missing in the semi-finals was back for the third place match as Bethlehem Academy ended their season with a win and received individual medals to go along with the team trophy.

The fourth place team receives a team trophy but no individual medals.

It appeared the pressure of making the finals was gone and the Cardinals could simply go out and have fun which is usually a pretty good recipe for success.

In addition to Campbell's efficient attack, sophomore Laney Donahue had 10 kills and 13 digs.

Junior libero Olivia Nass led the Cardinals with 15 digs and 8th grader Abby Jandro tallied 37 assists and 12 digs.

Bethlehem Academy had 5.5 blocks and Wadena-Deer Creek 3 in the match.

The match featured volleyball coaching titans Franz Boelter and Sue Volkmann.

Boelter collected his 603rd win in 26 years.  Volkmann has 533 wins in 31 seasons.

The Wolverines finished their season 26-8 and the Cardinals were 18-15.

Bethlehe Academy at State. Photo by Gordy Kosfeld
Bethlehe Academy at State. Photo by Gordy Kosfeld
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