The Lady Cardinals beat the Sacred Heart Crusaders in three decisive matches Friday to defend their State Championship title.
The girls were trying to repeat their success from a year ago and were looking to become Back-to-Back Champions which has not occurred at Belmont since Coach Kuykendall’s ’85-’86 basketball teams. They had an outpouring of support with a huge section of the Newell Grissom building in white. The fans and student section, who have shown their support all year, were loud and ready to go!!!
In the rematch from last year, the Lady Cardinals set the tone with a huge block from Sadie Randolph on the first point of the game. Then the Lady Cardinals came out hitting hard and the Lady Crusaders were shocked in the first set when Belmont jumped out to an early 17-2 lead.  Sacred Heart didn’t have an answer for Giselle Lopez’s serves and the big kills from Meredith Eaton and Kerstin Moody. Belmont went on to dominate the first set 25-12.
In the 2nd set, Sydnee Wilemon had some great swings but the Lady Crusaders battled hard, in the beginning, to keep the set close. Belmont pulled away when Sacred Heart couldn’t get any hits down due to the stellar play of Anna Karen Merino, and, in part, thanks to the bench who kept the energy up and cheered on the team every single point of the game. The Lady Cardinals went on to win the set 25-17.
In the 3rd set, Belmont played spectacularly with perfect sets from Addyson Liles and Madasen McCaig which led to huge kills from the stellar front row of Belmont. The Lady Cardinals cruised to a 25-13 win.  At the end of the game, the joy was evident in each girl’s eyes that they had accomplished the goal that they had set out to do over a year ago. They put in hard work every day and during the offseason to lead up to this Repeat Championship!