C1 VB State Finals: Advance steadies itself, moves on to another title game

Advance High School players Olivia Kennedy (left) and Addi Carlton put up a block against Santa Fe on Friday at the Show Me Center in the semifinal of the MSHSAA Class 1 Volleyball State Finals.

Tom Davis ~ Tdavis@semoball.com

The Advance High School volleyball squad has several new faces on it this season, but the ultimate results have pretty much been the same old, same old.

The Hornets will play for their sixth MSHSAA Class 1 State Championship in the past seven seasons today after they knocked off Santa Fe 25-16, 25-14, 21-25, 25-12 on Friday at the Show Me Center in the semifinal round of the state tournament.

“We did a good job of mixing up our swings,” veteran Advance coach Erin Hoffman said following the win. “Hitting the line, hitting across, in the middle, (and) doing a tip.”

Five of the eight players (Addi Carlton, Brogan Wright-Hawkins, Emma Eilers, Kyndall Hitt, and Olivia Kennedy) that Hoffman utilized on Friday also played in the 2023 Final Four. Despite that experience, the Hornets (23-11-2) got off to a shaky start against the Chiefs (23-10).

With her team trailing 6-0 to open the match, Hoffman turned to her assistant coach Dana Below, and just shrugged her shoulders.

“I’ve got a couple of players who have pretty high IQ,” Hoffman explained of her nonchalance early in the match. “They do a really good job of seeing the court.

“I knew after the first points they were thinking ‘OK, we need to block line here, they were figuring out the other team.”

Hoffman hasn’t stumble-bumbled her way to 732 career victories. Her players responded with a 9-3 run to tie the opening set at nine before ultimately leading 16-10 and forcing Santa Fe to call a timeout.

“Up until recently,” Hoffman explained, “I’ve been known for not calling timeouts during the regular season because they need to figure out how to get themselves out of (trouble).”

The Hornets cruised through the remainder of the opening set and didn’t have much stress in the second set either. However, the Chiefs fought back in the third set.

“(The players) need to figure out how to work together,” Hoffman said, “and help out their teammates. Sometimes, especially at the beginning (of a match), I like to just let them figure things out.”

Advance regrouped quickly after dropping the third set and led 8-2, which forced the Chiefs to call a timeout, and eventually 17-6 when Santa Fe took another break.

“I still feel like we could have been more aggressive on offense,” Hoffman said.

Carlton paced the Hornets with 51 total attacks while Eilers (47), Kennedy (30), Cashlynn Sturgeon (23), and

Ava Bowling (22) were also active.

Hitt served up 46 aces while Eilers and Wright-Hawkins each had 22 digs.

Carlton added 18 digs, Hitt had 15 and Bowling had 12.

Advance will face Winona (33-3-2) today at 12 p.m. in the championship match.

The Wildcats topped Jasper 25-14, 25-17, 25-14.

Winona beat Advance 2-0 in mid-September in the Dig For Life Tournament, which ironically, was also played in Cape Girardeau.