BE boys volleyball hits the big time!
Wed, 11/08/2023 - 9:32am
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By:
Philip M. Bowman, sports@thedanielislandnews.com
No asterisk needed. And this accomplishment was just as awesome.
The Bishop England boys’ volleyball team won the first official Class AAAA state championship Nov. 2 with a 3-0 victory over Catawba Ridge in a match that was contested at Dreher High School.
But if you want to know the rest of the story, it was BE’s second state title.
Last year, the High School League sanctioned boys’ volleyball as a sport, but not the playoffs. Bishop England swept through the season, went undefeated and capped the 16-0 season with a victory in the unauthorized state championship.
This time it’s official as the Bishops finished with an 18-3 record.
“It was an unreal feeling to repeat as state champions,” coach Alec Swanson said. “But this one is actually official. It’s great for this team to win the first (Class AAAA) state championship. It’s amazing to win a Class AAAA state title when you are a Class AA school.”
The Bishops’ path to the state title wasn’t an easy one.
They began the playoffs as the No. 4 seed and defeated Philip Simmons in the first round. They followed that up with an upset of No. 1 seed Myrtle Beach to advance to the Lower State championship against Lucy Beckham High School. The Bengals won the first two sets of the best-of-five match. But the Bishops recovered to score the victory, 3-2.
“That was an incredible match,” Swanson said. “The boys had a lot of resiliency and they knew it wasn’t over. We remained positive and had nine seniors who provided the leadership when we needed it.”
Catawba Ridge jumped to an 11-6 lead in the first set, but it was mostly all Bishop England after the Copperheads’ impressive start. Catawba Ridge, located in Fort Mill, finished with a 21-9-1 record.
Next year’s team will look quite different from this year or last, when the Bishops combined to win 34 matches against only three setbacks. The nine seniors who played in their final match include Aidan Alexander, Preston Cederquist, Thomas Dietrich, Stephen McCartee, Will Mazur, Quinn McDougall, Zach Mullen, Niko Orthner, and Andrew Puckhaber.