HUTCHINSON – When Andale closed the book on its 2024 volleyball season and started looking ahead to 2025, senior Hayden Grimes called her shot.
 
“I just know whenever I walked in Day 1, I told the whole team, ‘This is our year. We’re winning a state championship this year,’” Grimes said.
 
The Indians’ powerful outside hitter and four-year starter shared her prophecy with reporters Saturday on the Hutchinson Sports Arena court, a few feet from where she made it happen. As Andale’s three-set duel with Hayden for the Class 4A championship reached its moment of truth, Grimes elevated and blasted a shot off a Hayden blocker’s fingertips and beyond the reach of the other Wildcats, giving the Indians a 25-12, 25-27, 25-22 victory and their second state title in five years.
 
Andale, the tournament’s top seed, completed the toughest day of its 36-1 season with victories over Clay Center, which was ranked No. 1 in the Kansas Volleyball Association’s 4A rankings, and No. 3 Hayden.
 

The Indians’ 23-25, 25-19, 25-18 semifinal victory over Clay Center marked the first time in seven weeks that Andale dropped a set. The previous occasion came in the Indians’ lone loss, a three-set decision against Class 5A state qualifier Bishop Carroll in the finals of the Valley Center Invitational.
 
“A lot of the teams we played in the regular season, we were beating comfortably,” Andale’s second-year head coach Scott Johnson said. “Not a bad problem to have. The kids kept asking, ‘Can we play tougher competition? We want tougher competition.’
 
“I said, ‘The schedule is what it is, but they’re coming.’ They weren’t shy when they got to tougher competition, and they were ready to go.”
 
The decisive set of Andale’s championship quest was a classic, featuring 13 ties. It contrasted wildly with the two sets that preceded it. While Andale dominated the first set, Hayden controlled most of the second before the Indians put together a furious comeback.
 
“The last one could have been a 50-50 game,” Hayden coach Corrinne McGreevy said. “It could have gone either way. Those were two incredible teams. What a great state championship match. That was awesome.”
 

Andale was on a bit of a mission this season after a six-year run of state tournament appearances came to a halt in 2024. Grimes’ junior campaign ended with a knee injury that benched her for the sub-state tournament, which ended with Andale falling to McPherson in the title match.
 
Ironically, Grimes, a Colorado State commit, finished her high school career Saturday dealing with leg cramps and a sore Achilles.
 
“I was standing at left back and you could tell I was in pain,” Grimes said. “Scott looked at me and was like, ‘Do I need to take a timeout?’ I just took a deep breath and I was like, ‘No, in this moment, I just want to finish the game. I’m OK. Don’t use a timeout.’”
 
After rebounding from its opening-set loss to defeat Clay Center, the Indians showed no signs of trouble early in the championship against Hayden.
 
Hayden, third at state a year ago and looking for its first 4A title since 2019, dominated Paola 25-18, 25-8 in the semifinals. But the Wildcats never led in the first set of the final, trailing 8-2, 15-6 and 20-9.
 

Reagan Winter, Andale’s 6-foot-2 middle blocker, scored two of the final three points of the set, punctuating it with a kill off Hayden’s block attempt.
 
“The first game we kind of just got in our way, and that’s part of volleyball,” McGreevy said. “Sometimes it’s a trickle-down effect, and you start making errors and you just can’t stop. And we could not stop. But we bounced back.”
 
Indeed, the frenzied atmosphere shifted sides of the arena in the second set, as Hayden used three consecutive kills from sophomore Hailey Schmidtlein to build an 8-4 lead. Sophomore Sophia Wichman’s kill down the line made it 14-7 and forced Johnson to use a timeout.
 
Hayden led 19-10 after a service error by Andale libero Carley Keller, and the match appeared destined for a third set. The Wildcats ultimately evened the match, but not until they withstood Andale’s furious charge.
 
Senior Mayla Spexarth’s kill launched the comeback, which was aided by a series of Hayden offensive errors. When junior Abbey McNeal delivered back-to-back kills, the Wildcats’ lead was down to 21-19.
 
Andale continued to apply the pressure and earned a match point when Grimes’ kill put the Indians up 25-24. But Schmidtlein countered with two kills, then blocked Grimes’ spike attempt to give Hayden the set.
 
“She put us on her back and said, ‘I’m leading us. I’m leading the charges,’” McGreevy said of the 5-foot-11 Schmidtlein. “She’s a big-time player. She loves big-time matches like that and thrives in them.”
 

The third set was nip and tuck, with neither team leading by more than two points until Grimes followed Spexarth’s impressive dig with a kill to stretch Andale’s lead to 22-19. Grimes and Spexarth soon added kills that set up championship point.
 
Schmidtlein fended off one of three match points with her final kill of the season. But Grimes, who started her career as a libero before switching to hitter and amassing over 1,000 kills, followed with a swing that sent the Indians to the floor in celebration.
 
“I don’t think there’s ever going to be any words that could describe that feeling that you have of winning a state championship,” Grimes said.
 
The moment capped a journey in which Johnson challenged his senior captain to focus not on the state championship, but making her teammates better. Grimes embraced it, and was rewarded for it Saturday.
 
“She’s worked her butt off,” Johnson said. “She’s made everybody better around her. It’s no secret who we’re going to there and for her to have the success she had this weekend with essentially a target on her back, she is, in my opinion, the best player in 4A.”
 

 CLASS 4A
 
At Hutchinson Sports Arena
 
Semifinals
 
Andale def. Clay Center 23-25, 25-19, 25-18; Hayden def. Paola 25-18, 25-8.
 
Championship
 
Andale def. Hayden 25-12, 25-27, 25-22.
 
Third place
 
Clay Center def. Paola 25-11, 25-13.