Staff
Baudette native Shelby Nosan, an all-star shortstop for the Stratton Eagles, now can add volleyball manager extraordinaire to her résumé.
She combined with some other highly-talented spikers she knows from Minnesota to form Safe Sets, which mowed down the rest of the 10-team field to win the 10th-annual Struchan Gilson Memorial volleyball tournament Saturday at Fort High.
Safe Sets did not drop a single set in seven matches, starting and finishing with wins over two-time defending Fort Frances Women’s Volleyball League champion How I Set Your Mother.
The second was a 2-0 sweep in the tourney final (25-14/25-13).
“We played in a few tourneys down here and then [Fort league member] Candy Teeple said we should come up for the tourney,” said Nosan, who will be doing double fastball duty this summer with both the Eagles in the Rainy River District Fastball League and the Dawson Tigers in her rookie season in the Rainy River District Women’s Fastball League.
“I told her I doubt they would because of the four-hour drive, but they said yes,” she added.
“Four of them had never been to Canada before so it was a fun experience for them.
“We talked a lot about the accents and different words they heard on our drive back,” Nosan chuckled.
The quartet included the mother-daughter pairing of Kristy and Kayla Fink.
Kristy is the head coach of the Henning Hornets high school girls’ volleyball team while Kayla, who played college ball at the University of Wisconsin-Superior, serves as her assistant.
Also among the first-time Canadian visitors were sisters Jordan and Shania Glenz, who played on the Verndale Pirates high school girls’ squad, with the latter slated to play at the University of Wisconsin-River Falls this fall.
They and Nosan joined forces with former Rainy River Community College Voyageurs’ player Brooke Millerbernd, daughter of RRCC women’s coach Mel Millerbernd.
Safe Sets finished first in Pool ‘A,’ then won its quarter-final match against Pool ‘B’ fourth-place squad Scared Hitless and its semi-final over Pool ‘B’ second-place Bump It Up.
The runners-up finished second in Pool ‘A,’ losing its opener to Safe Sets but then not losing again until their rematch in the final.
That included wins over Pool ‘A’ third-place club Gillons’ in the quarter-finals and then upsetting Pool ‘B’ winner A Case of the Hits in the semi-finals.
Bump It Up (second in Pool ‘B’) topped Electric Slide (third in Pool ‘A’) while A Case of the Hits dumped Let’s Talk About Sets (fourth in Pool ‘A’) in the other quarter-finals.
A Case of the Hits went on to capture third place by rallying from a one-set deficit to down Bump It Up 2-1 (23-25, 25-21, and 15-6).
