‘Did You Guys Believe?’

This hectic, crazy week of volleyball is a perfect punctuation for our state. It was probably appropriate that the Nebraska, Wisconsin game kicked it off on Saturday night. The high school version wasn’t too crazy as we embarked on postseason play — read — most of the top seeds were winners and advanced.

Let’s set you up for Saturday’s big day before we head to Pinnacle Bank Arena next Wednesday for the start of the 2023 state tournament; one of the NSAA’s best events. So good.

How do we get there? The Class A field is basically set after district play concluded last night and it appears the top-eight teams in the points could lead to a highly competitive tournament. For the other five classes, we have “district” final matches on Saturday where the winners advance to Lincoln.

Let’s dive in and see where we are right now.

The Cream Rises to the Top

CLASS A. The state’s best in the biggest class will all be in Lincoln. Not sure you’d want it any different than that. In the serpentine format, the biggest game usually involves the A-7 final, with the 7th and 8th overall seeds fighting for a final spot and the loser hoping for no upsets and an at-large berth to state.

We got that at Pius on Wednesday night. Jacob Padilla from nebpreps.com was at the game and had a full game thread as Lincoln Pius won in four sets. Faith Venable had 20 kills to lead the Thunderbolts and setter Sami Chesley had 55 assists. Morgan Glaser had 14 kills for the Monarchs, who should get crosstown rival No. 1 Papillion-LaVista South in the opening round next Wednesday.

What else? It was chalky the rest of the night. Two other Lincoln teams will advance as Lincoln Southwest and Lincoln East both held on to seeds two and three with sweeps of Millard North and Millard South, respectively. Westside defeated Gretna 3-1 and the classes surprise team Grand Island is back at state for the first time since 2013 with a sweep of Columbus in their fifth match of the season. The other qualifier is Bellevue West, which lost the opening set to Millard West before winning 3-1.

The Big Four

CLASS B. As Omaha Skutt tries for a ninth straight Class B title there have been three chasers most of the season. And they will all take the top four seeds to the state tournament, should they advance on Saturday. Norris, Elkhorn, Bennington — all from the Eastern Midlands Conference — will be seeded 1, 2 and 4 for the district finals.

Top-ranked Skutt, with their 25-13 record on a national schedule, will be the third-seed. Skutt rolled to a sweep of Omaha Duchesne on Wednesday to advance, while Wednesday’s other winners were Elkhorn North (3-1 over Bennington) and Northwest (3-0 over Hastings). Northwest will get newbie Gretna East on Saturday.

Saturday, Saturday. Blair at Norris; Omaha Mercy at Elkhorn North; Alliance at Omaha Skutt; Omaha Duchesne at Bennington; Gering at Waverly; Northwest at Gretna East; Beatrice at Seward; Crete at Scottsbluff. Winners will advance to the state tournament.

The Rest of the Story

CLASS C-1. One of the deepest fields in the state should have an electric Saturday trying to advance to Lincoln. On Tuesday, Kearney Catholic gave Minden their first loss of the season and the pair seems poised for a run at the title in Lincoln with many worthy chasers. Drake commit Carolyn Maser had GICC laser focused in a 3-1 win over Adams Central. Malcolm sophomore Halle Dolliver set a school record for kills in a season in a sweep over Wahoo.

CLASS C-2. Can someone unseat top-ranked Lincoln Lutheran in Class C-2? Maxwell will get the first shot on Saturday. As for the chasers? They come from the East Husker — Clarkson/Leigh, Oakland-Craig and Humphrey/LHF — but, we can’t rule out Yutan and Elmwood-Murdock among others. But these Warriors are loaded, with just a pair of losses to Kearney Catholic and Norris.

CLASS D-1. Likely the most wide open class in the state this year. GACC, Southwest and Amherst have traded the top-spot a few times and they’ll all be in district finals. But, it’s Sumner-Eddyville-Miller which has beat Amherst twice that could be building momentum. Also on the radar, St. Mary’s (30-1), BDS (26-4) and a host of others.

CLASS D-2. Another 1 vs. 2 sub-district final matchup went to No. 2 on Wednesday when Cambridge (25-4) knocked off Overton (28-3). Now that they will be on opposite sides of a state bracket does a state final rematch await? It’s very possible. No one else has been in the top-two all season in this class. Other Saturday top seeds are Meridian, Wallace, Wynot, Stuart, HTRS and Central Valley.

FULL SATURDAY LIST OF GAMES

A Final Football Reminder

As the football playoffs continue on, or just get started, we hope that you’ll find our headquarters pages for each class an easy place to keep up on scores, streams, radio links and stories. As always, if you find them valuable, share with a friend.

Class A/B Headquarters // Class C-1 and C-2 Headquarters // Eight-Man Headquarters // Six-Man Headquarters

On Friday, we hope to be at parts of nine games if all goes well. Our Newsletter, will be on Sunday for a full update on the playoffs and volleyball state tournament. Enjoy the games!!