Another Spud-mashing by the Cardinals

By Tom Obert
Cub Reporter
The Section 8, No. 1 volleyball seed, Alexandria Cardinals opened section play tonight with a 23-25, 25-13, 25-10, and 25-21 win over the Moorhead Spuds.

The Cards started slowly in the first game, probably tight in their first play-off game (the Spuds handily beat Brainerd on Wednesday while the Cards had a bye), and gave up the last four points to lose it. Then they played like a No. 1 seed in the next two games, winning both easily. Then in the 4th game, the Spuds rushed off to a big early lead, forcing the Cards to make a big comeback. Next we will play either Big Lake or Elk River at a neutral site.

The Cards were led by their big front line of 6'1" junior Ariel Carlson, 5' 11" sophomore Angela Christianson, and 5'9" junior Sam Dale (the one player who never comes off the court); the back line stars tonight were 5'5" junior Greta Wood (who was player of the game with 23 points from her serve), 5'6" junior Valerie Smith, 5'7" senior Maggie Snyder, and 5'5" senior Kailynn Strater; sophomore players to watch will be 5'10" Jacque Brown, 5'4" Katie Brown . . . and, of course, Annen and I sat with the proud grandparents of 5'10" Sam Trumm (Jack and "Jenny") and 5'8" Emma Sieling (Dave and Carol (who suffered through every point) Dittberner).

Explanatory note from the blog photo desk: The cub reporter rushed home to file his story and then looked at his photos. Unfortunately, the team photo of the victorious Cardinal volleyball squad was totally obscured by a fan. He did manage, however, to properly photograph an unrelated comic sumo wrestler who had nothing to do with the story. Faced with a Hobson's choice, the desk presents both photos for your amusement and shall continue to wonder where he squandered the photo school tuition.