Staff photo by Travis Rosenau Minnesota Valley Lutheran’s Brennan Bendix and Bradyn Kube (19) celebrate Bendix’s second-quarter touchdown catch during a Section 3AA football playoff game with Sibley East Tuesday night at Johnson Field in New Ulm.

NEW ULM — It was about as pretty as Tuesday night’s ugly conditions allowed, but Minnesota Valley Lutheran got more than it needed to earn a shutout playoff win.

Through rain and muck, the fourth-seeded Chargers shut out fifth-seeded Sibley East in a Section 3AA football playoff game at Johnson Field.

With the win, the Chargers advance to a semifinals meeting at top-seeded Jackson County Central at 3 p.m. Saturday.

“I’m just proud of the guys,” MVL head coach Jim Buboltz said. “We had one turnover where we fumbled it in these conditions and we got two back. So I’m very, very happy with that. I thought the guys handled the conditions that way, I thought that they didn’t let it dictate the game that way, which I’m especially happy with, I thought that our offensive line did a very nice job and an overall great effort by our defense.”

The Chargers worked the ball down the field methodically on their first drive of the first quarter, finishing the drive with a 1-yard TD run by Robby Trebelhorn. Quarterback Kaden Peterson then found Ben Pearson on a 2-point conversion pass to give MVL an 8-0 lead.

For the Chargers’ next move to the end zone, Peterson connected down the sideline with Brennan Bendix on a 39-yard pass to get the Chargers into the red zone. A few plays later, Bendix was rewarded for his efforts with a 12-yard touchdown pass.

The TD grab was anything but easy for Bendix, though, as he was forced to rip away the pass from the Wolverines’ Evan Garcia before falling to the soaked end zone.

“We were in hurry-up … I’m running middle, slot guy’s running outside,” Bendix said on his TD grab. “And KP threw it to me, and I don’t know how I caught it, but I got it [laughs].”

Pearson grabbed his second 2-point grab of the night to put the Chargers up 16-0.

That was the last time either team got close to the end zone as the Chargers took that 16-0 lead into the half. Anytime it seemed like the rain was about to let up, it quickly returned and led to several fumbles from both sides. None of those fumbles in the second half ended up as turnovers, but the Chargers simply needed to be smart and keep the run going to tick the clock away for the win.

The Chargers did keep the ball moving with the run, but Peterson still managed to get off some passes in the second half when needed.

“We were more of a passing team for the whole year,” Bendix said. “So we’re going to stick to it when we can, even through the wet, rainy weather.”

Wolverines QB Joseph Ballalatak had one last-second heave at the end of the game, and while Pearson could have opted for an easy interception on the pass, he purposely swatted the ball it into the ground with both hands to end the game.

The Chargers had a rough end of the regular season, dropping five games in a row. But the home playoff win in less-than-ideal conditions Tuesday night was a good way to hit the restart button ahead of a rematch with JCC on Saturday.

JCC defeated MVL at home 47-6 on Oct. 6.

“We put the last five weeks behind us and came out here with a fresh slate,” Buboltz said. “Because that’s what it is, it’s playoff time, everybody is 0-0, so now we’re 1-0 and now we’ve got to go 1-0 one more time.”