While the varsity girls won the Valley Conference when they beat Alden-Conger on October 4, tonight (Monday), they won the Tomahawk-Valley Conference championship too when they beat Buffalo Lake-Hector-Stewart in Hector.
Head coach Dave Nixon said it was a team win.
“We had to rely on everybody. Our blocking was better than it has been. If our blockers get the block set up, we can defend pretty well. It set up our defense, and we did a good job of digging the ball. We passed well, we set well, we controlled the tempo.”
Ironically, section seeding came out today, and BLHS is the number one seed while Cleveland is ranked second. The Mustangs suffered just one defeat prior to Cleveland coming to town: a 2-1 tournament loss to Pipestone Area. Last year, Cleveland beat the Mustangs 3-1 on the St. Peter court in the section semi-final.
The Clippers host 15th-seeded Springfield on October 20. The winner of that game plays the winner of seventh-ranked New Ulm Cathedral vs 10-ranked Madelia. Cedar Mountain is ranked third and in the Clipper side of the bracket while Sleepy Eye St. Mary’s is the fourth seed and in BLHS’s side.
So two weeks from Thursday is the section final, and the Mavericks will certainly be studying the match against Cleveland before that, but Nixon said giving the Mustangs a look at the Clippers was still a benefit to the Clippers.
“We want to play good teams. We want to be battle tested going into the playoffs. It helps to be in a tight situation so you know how to handle it.”
But several section teams are capable of knocking off either the Clippers or the Mustangs.
“We have to put in some work to get there,” Nixon said.” We beat some good teams, but we have to do it again. We have to play our best volleyball at the end of the year to move on.”
Winning game one 25-15, the Clippers made a statement early against the Mustangs.
“We came out fired up and were clicking right away,” said Nixon. “We were the aggressor, and that kept them from getting into their offense. They have some athletes who can really do some damage offensively.”
In game two, they went on a six-point spurt to lead 17-14. Taylor McCabe, who paced the offense with 30 kills for the night, had three kills in that sequence.
“Jocelyn (Kortuem) did some really good setting,” McCabe said, “and there were some holes in the block. It was easy to find them and (libero) Delany (Thompson) was calling where to hit.”
On the next point, it looked like McCabe’s hit caromed off the hands of a blocker and out of bounds, but the refs reversed the original call, and the point went to the Mustangs. Perhaps flustered a bit, the Clippers lost nine of the next 12 points to trail 24-20.
But Melia Sathoff hit back-to-back winners, and with a hit out and a Kaitlyn Flowers serve that slid off the hands of a Maverick defender, the Clippers deadlocked the game at 24. The Clippers got discombobulated during a set, and the next point went to BLHS before the game ended 26-24 on Mustang kill.
Facing along the net, Kortuem flung over a winner to put the Clippers in front 10-9 in game three, and the Clippers never lost the lead from there. Down the stretch, McCabe smacked a kill and tipped over an ace for a 22-17 Clipper advantage.
On the next point, Thompson dispatched an ace serve. The Mavericks came up with a kill, but McCabe did too for game point. The Clippers tipped the ball out of bounds after, but they won 25-19 when McCabe’s hit ricocheted off the hands of a defender, bounced off the ceiling and crashed to the floor.
With the Clippers behind 7-4 in game four, Keira Schipper stretched for an ace block to start a 10-point Clipper surge. The run also featured three McCabe kills and a McCabe ace block, a Maile Meissner kill, a Sathoff kill, two Mustang hits out of bounds and a Mustang back row attack infraction.
BLHS never recovered from there, and the game ended 25-17 when Kortuem pushed over a winner.
“At the end we need some of the middles to get out of the way to let Jocelyn be a threat offensively on some of those digs that were tight, and that’s tough,” Nixon said. “It’s tough to play middle, but we want to make sure that when Jocelyn is front row, she’s a threat to send it over.”
Sathoff had 19 kills, nine digs and one set assist. Thompson scooped 25 digs and set up one point. McCabe had eight digs. Kortuem set up 51 points and had three kills and five digs. Luci Blaschko had seven digs and one set assist before leaving game three with an injury. Schipper had one kill and three digs. Aubrey Blaschko had one kill and two digs before exiting the match early in game three with injury. Meissner had three digs. Flowers had eight digs. Cheyenne Lotspeich had one dig. Meissner had three kills. Liviana Lee had one set assist.
“We had a couple of girls that had to go out with an ankle or a knee, but it was next player up,” Nixon said. “The girls who came in did the job.”
Thompson was 25 for 25 from the service line with two of them aces. Flowers and Sathoff each dished up two ace serves. Meissner had one solo ace block and three ace block assists. Aubrey Blaschko had one solo ace block and two ace block assists. Schipper had one solo ace block and one ace block assist. McCabe and Kortuem each had one ace block assist.
“Aubrey has been doing a good job blocking from the outside. Maile has been very active, Keira has been very active,” Nixon said. “Everyone did a good job tonight. There were a couple of times where we had some miscommunication and let the ball drop, but we’ll fix that. It was a team win.”
Formed at the start of last season, the Tomahawk-Valley Conference is the result of a cooperation between the two conferences that sets up regular-season crossover games between them and holds a championship game in several sports between the winners of each conference.
In their final regular season game, the Clippers return to action tonight when they travel to Arlington to take on Sibley East.
Above: After the game, the Clippers were presented with the Tomahawk-Valley Conference Champion traveling trophy as well as the Valley Conference Champion trophy. They are, from L-R, front row: Natalie Flowers, Luci Blaschko, Sierra Lotspeich, Amelia Chmiel, Taylor Wolf, Delaney Thompson, Taylor McCAbe, Aubrey Blaschko, and Valentina Rohlfing. Back row: Head coach Dave Nixon, Neenah Lassiter, Kaitlyn Flowers, Melia Sathoff, Ava Kluntz, Liviana Lee, Maile Meissner, Jocelyn Kortuem, Anna Lamont, Cheyenne Lotspeich and assistant coach April Thompson.
The Mustangs didn’t have an answer for Taylor McCabe’s 30 kills. Covering are Jocelyn Kortuem and Luci Blaschko.
Melia Sathoff goes up for a kill.
Aubrey Blaschko and Maile Meissner reach for a block.
The Clippers celebrate after the match-winning point.