Dexter, Bernie to meet in SCAA volleyball championship for second straight year

BLOOMFIELD, Mo. - The stage is set for the Bernie Mules and Dexter Bearcats to meet in the championship game of the SCAA varsity volleyball tournament for a second straight season following semifinal action Thursday at Bloomfield.

DUSTIN WARD - dward@dailystatesman.com Advance's Brylee Morse watches Bernie's Morgan Baker set a ball Thursday night at Bloomfield.

Top-seeded Dexter punched its ticket to the title game with a 25-17, 25-13 victory against the fourth-seeded Bloomfield Wildcats Thursday. Second-seeded Bernie followed with a 25-21, 25-22 victory against the third-seeded Advance Hornets in the nightcap.

2012 conference champ Bernie and 2013 conference champ Dexter square off tonight at about 8 p.m. in Bloomfield to decide the 2014 conference title.

Bernie collected its third victory of the season against Advance Thursday.

The Mules jumped out to a 10-4 lead against the Hornets in both sets.

Advance cut the deficit as close as 23-20 in the opening set, but never caught Bernie.

The second set was a different story.

The Hornets scored seven straight points against the Mules to tie things up at 18-18 in set two. Bernie scored the next three points to move back ahead 21-18 before Advance tied things up again at 22-22 after three straight Bernie attack errors. The Mules withstood the charge and scored the final three points on an Advance attack error, kill by Addie Shelton and block by Mabree Stone to secure a straight-set victory.

DUSTIN WARD - dward@dailystatesman.com> Bernie's Addie Shelton watches Advance's Hannah Clark make a set.

"We've been working real hard," Bernie coach Erin Hoffman said. "We don't know how to finish a game. We start out strong and then slack in the middle. In each game we had a run of about five unforced errors in a row. We need to figure out how to keep that from happening."

Cayla Mayberry tallied five of her team-leading seven kills for the Mules in the second set. Kayli Tanner collected six of her team-high seven kills for Bernie in the first set. Morgan Baker added three more kills.

Brylee Morse paced Advance with nine kills. Krystal James added five kills and Alanis Below had four kills for the Hornets.

Hannah Clark had 14 assists and Kimsey Lillard tallied a team-high 10 digs for Advance.

Players in the first varsity semifinal had the luxury of playing in an electric atmosphere that featured strong student cheering sections by Dexter and Bloomfield.

"I love the games where people are up," Dexter coach Carmen Morgan said. "We've had a really good group of boys. It's not a large group, but they make a lot of noise and we appreciate them coming. Bloomfield had a good group of boys. It makes it fun to play with a crowd like that."

Dexter never trailed either set scoring five of the first six points in the opening set and the first five points of the second set.

DUSTIN WARD - dward@dailystatesman.com Bloomfield's Rachel Pullum makes a pass.

Bloomfield got as close as 14-12 in the first set after falling behind 10-4. Dexter followed with a 10-1 run to pad its advantage to 24-13.

Dexter opened up a 16-6 lead in the second set and led by at least eight the rest of the way.

Dexter is the only SCAA team to beat a red-hot Bloomfield program that has flourished under first-year head coach Sherilyn Long.

"Bloomfield has improved a lot since we've played them early," Morgan said. "Lindsey Young is putting the ball down well for them and she's got that left arm so she's kind of a hard one to catch. Lefties are always hard to deal with.

"Unforced errors are always our Achilles heel," Morgan added. "We got in the net four times and missed four serves. I don't know the last time we missed four serves. I don't know what that was about, but those are pretty easy mistakes to fix, normally."

Jessica Lindsey paced Dexter with 10 kills. Shyann Jines and Krysten Garrison both tallied six of the Bearcats' 24 kills.

Julia Hahn had 11 assists and Garrison had 10 assists for Dexter.

DUSTIN WARD - dward@dailystatesman.com Dexter's Kendall Adams blocks a ball at the net.

Chelsea Delay had five kills, Lindsey Young added three more kills and Jewel Chism tallied two kills for Bloomfield.

Bernie enters the conference championship with a record of 20-8. Dexter supports a record of 26-2-1. Bernie is ranked No. 9 in Class 1 and Dexter is ranked No. 6 in Class 3 in the latest state rankings provided by the Missouri Volleyball Coaches Association.

"It's going to be a great game and great chance for us to get a whole lot better," Hoffman said. "Sometimes when you have minimal numbers you don't have the players in practice that can help prepare you. This will be a chance for us to get a lot stronger and I'm excited about it."

Dexter has won 18 straight games entering Friday night's championship.

"We just have to go out and play our game," Morgan said. "We want to get rid of the unforced errors, stay up and stay after it."

Dexter is slated to square off against Woodland in the junior varsity title game Friday at about 7 p.m. Top-seeded Dexter beat fifth-seeded Bloomfield 25-7, 25-12 in the first junior varsity semifinal Thursday. Second-seeded Woodland followed with a 25-10, 25-14 victory against third-seeded Advance in the final junior varsity semifinal.

Advance (14-13-2) takes on Bloomfield (16-10-2) in the varsity third-place match Friday at 6 p.m. Bloomfield plays Advance in the junior varsity third-place match Friday at 5 p.m.

DUSTIN WARD - dward@dailystatesman.com Bloomfield's Lindsey Young tips a ball.

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