Breaking News
Local Sports

Knights tested by No. 4 Clippers

Thompson gets 1,000th career dig for Cleveland in sweep

By Travis Rosenau 5 min read

SLEEPY EYE -- When the Cleveland Clippers came to Sleepy Eye St. Mary's High School on Monday night, it was about as tough of a challenge outside of playoffs that the Knights will face this season.

The Clippers showed why that was the case and why they're the No. 4-ranked team in Class A, sweeping the Knights 25-13, 25-14, 25-23 in a Tomahawk-Valley Conference crossover volleyball match.

Senior libero Delaney Thompson captained the Clippers' defense with 19 digs, picking up her 1,000th career dig in the process.

The Clippers, who made the state tournament last year, moved to 13-1 with the win and earned their 13th sweep of the season also. Their only loss came to Mayer Lutheran, the No. 3 team in Class A, on Sept. 15.

Getting a milestone was a great feeling for her, but it meant even more to do it with such a talented team.

"It just means so much more because as a team, we all just work together and my digs represents our team," Thompson said. "I couldn't get my digs without us working together and getting the ball back over to the other side. It means a lot more being a successful team and everyone plays their best against us, so it's fun. Everyone wants to bring their best competition and then we get to bring our best, too."

Taylor McCabe led the Clippers' attack with 14 kills and added eight digs, while Melia Sathoff had 10 kills, 11 digs and three total blocks and Jocelyn Kortuem had 20 set assists, four total blocks and three kills. Aubrey Blaschko added three kills for the Clippers.

Morgan Mathiowetz led the Knights with 10 kills and 16 digs, while Audra Hoffmann had five kills and seven digs and Olivia Schieffert had two kills and seven digs. Nell Weiss added two kills also for the Knights, while Brynne Ibberson had 10 set assists and eight digs and Taylor Mathiowetz had eight set assists and six digs.

"We've been trying out a couple different rotations in the last couple weeks here, so we started in a rotation that we're not as comfortable with, so I think that was kind of a hard thing to start in," Knights head coach Crissi Mangen said. "Then we went back to our typical rotation, which seemed to help a little bit better, the girls seemed a little bit more comfortable.

"But coming into the game, we knew we had to put up a big double block on their outsides. They are both incredible athletes and that block was going to be super important. I thought we did a better job getting touches tonight. However, we also let a lot fall in front of us and then our defense wasn't ready for the block touches."

Cleveland jumped out to a 4-1 lead in the opening set after a block from McCabe, but the Knights went on a quick 3-0 run, getting an ace from Weiss to tie it up. Moments later after the Knights got a block from Hoffmann to trail 9-7, the Clippers stormed away with an 11-0 run to lead 20-7.

That run forced Mangen to burn both of her timeouts in the set. The Knights got 3 consecutive points out of the timeout on a block from Hoffmann, an ace from Ibberson and a block from Weiss, but the Clippers finished the set on a 5-1 run to take a 1-0 match lead.

The Knights brought it to the Clippers early in the second set and took 7-6 and 8-7 leads on Morgan Mathiowetz kills, but a kill from Blaschko and a kill from Sathoff had the Clippers up 9-8, and they never trailed again after that in the set. A 5-0 run that ended on a block from Liviana Lee had the Clippers up 21-12 and the Clippers finished the set with a 4-2 run, winning it on a St. Mary's service error.

After Thompson earned her 1,000th career dig following the second point of Set 1, the Clippers had a few errors that helped the Knights take an early 5-3 lead. With the Clippers leading 17-13 midway through the set, the Knights got a 4-0 run to tie it up, with an ace from Hoffmann being the tying point. The Clippers got the lead back after that, but the Knights took it back, 19-18, on kills from Schieffert and Morgan Mathiowetz. The Clippers then got a 3-0 run to lead 22-20, and the Knights trailed 24-21 late after an ace from Kortuem. Kills from Hoffmann and Taylor Mathiowetz kept the Knights alive and down 24-23, but a serve into the net finished the match.

"[The third set] was much better," Mangen said. "I think we came into it with just, you've got nothing to lose at this point, right? We're facing the No. [4] team in the state and we needed to start swinging, and that's actually what ended up happening, which was really good to see. Our hitters started using the block rather than hitting into the block, they started tipping a lot smarter. … I think we have a lot of unleashed potential in our group that we have, but we'll see. At the end of the year, it could be a different story, we could be beating them. We'll see."

Thompson said ultimately, the Clippers had the Knights' number due to how they were able to move the ball.

"Definitely moving our ball around between the outside, the middle and the right side [was key]," Thompson said. "Their block couldn't keep up and our hitters could just put the ball away. It's hard or them to just key in one player, which I think our team is getting a lot stronger at."

The Knights fell to 11-2 with the loss.

Starting at /week.