Saints end 35-year state volleyball drought
By Kristi Nixon
CHARLES CITY — Even as she handled the medallion around her neck received for qualifying for the state volleyball tournament, St. Ansgar sophomore Lindsay Kruse found it hard to believe she and her teammates had pulled off a minor upset of Janesville.
In fact, the No. 9-ranked Saints made it look easy for the most part, save for a back-and-forth third set in a 25-18, 25-19, 30-28 victory over the sixth-ranked Wildcats at Charles City High School on Wednesday, Oct. 25.
“It really hasn’t clicked in yet,” Kruse said. “We haven’t done this since, like, 1986 or something. We don’t have any flags (banners) for volleyball. It still hasn’t really clicked in that I’m wearing this right now. We just need to get ready for the next game.”
As a matter of fact, according to head coach Tyler Johnson, it was 1988 the last year the Saints were playing on the state volleyball courts.
“They made it in ‘87,” he said, “and then, made it again in ‘88 and maybe twice in the ‘70s. Thirty-five years. I’m older than that – we won’t talk about how much older or what grade I was in when that might have happened . . .”
The Saints (24-6) earned the No. 5 seed and will face No. 4 seed BCLUW (34-10) on Tuesday, Oct. 31 at the Xtream Arena in Coralville at 8 p.m.
Despite the fact the Saints were going in as slight underdogs, they looked nothing like it against the Wildcats, owners of five state titles in the last 10 years and 12 state appearances overall. That would make a task like facing Janesville appear daunting, but it did not seem so.
“We tried not to be (intimidated),” senior setter Aspen Falk said. “I wasn’t. I can’t speak for the whole team. We definitely did not overlook them, though. I was expecting a close match. That’s what it was, especially that last set. I thought that one might have gotten away from us, but we pulled through, and it was a lot of fun.”
The full story, a side story from the last Saints’ volleyball coach to take them to state and more photos will be found in the Nov. 1 print and e-editions of the St. Ansgar Enterprise Journal.
