The Marshall High
School volleyball team matched history on Saturday by winning the Class 3A
state championship. The Tigers became the sixth school to win a state-best seven
volleyball titles, along with Bethlehem Academy, Chaska, Eagan, Robbinsdale
Armstrong, Tracy-Milroy (Balaton).
Earlier Saturday, the
Minneota Vikings lost to Mayer Lutheran in the Class 1A championship match.
Minneota has played in eight state title matches, winning three times.
Geographically
speaking, Marshall and Minneota are almost next door to one of the best NCAA
Division II volleyball programs in the country. Marshall High School is
literally across the street from Southwest Minnesota State University and
Minneota is only 15 miles away. And nobody can discount the impact of the
Southwest State Mustangs – and specifically head volleyball coach Terry Culhane
– on the sport in southwest Minnesota.
Before becoming coach
at SMSU 18 years ago, Culhane was a Hall of Fame high school volleyball and
girls basketball coach for two decades at Tracy, Tracy-Milroy and Marshall. He started his volleyball head coaching career
at Milroy in 1979 and became a five-time Minnesota State Volleyball Coach of
the Year, finishing with a high school career record of 519-112 in 22 seasons
as a head coach. His teams appeared in 15 state tournaments with six state
championships. Coaching basketball, he led Marshall to three state
tournaments, including state championships in 2001 and 2002. Before taking over
at Marshall, he led Tracy-Milroy to basketball state championships in 1992 and
1996.
Culhane announced last week that he will
retire when the current volleyball season ends at Southwest State, and his
impact on high school volleyball is immeasurable.
“I can't thank
that man enough for everything he's done for our program. We're just so
fortunate,” said Minneota coach Hayley Fruin, a Minneota alum who faced Culhane’s
teams when she played volleyball at Minnesota State Mankato.
“We've got a
lot of players on our team that have played club for him. And you can tell that
mentally he gets them prepared and puts them in situations that they don't get
frazzled.”
Marshall
coach Dan Westby was an assistant volleyball coach under Culhane for four
years, becoming the Tigers’ head coach when Culhane left for Southwest State in
2000.
“That was a
great thing for me,” Westby said. “I learned a lot from Terry. The number one
thing I've always told people that I learned from Terry is that everything you
do is about expectations. You put expectations on players, you put expectations
on coaches, and that's the one thing I really took away from Terry.”
Culhane is Southwest State’s all-time leader in victories with a career record
of 429-123, including 256-66 in Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference matches.
Under Culhane,
SMSU has made 15 NCAA tournament appearances, including 11 NCAA region
semifinal appearances, three NCAA region championship appearances and one NCAA
national runner-up finish (2014).
One of his most decorated
players is Minneota native Taylor Reiss, the National
Player of the Year in 2017 and 2018 who was named the NCAA Division II Honda
Female Athlete of the Year following the 2018-19 academic year. Reiss is now an
assistant coach at Southwest State.
Marshall won
its first volleyball title in 2004, Westby’s first year as head coach.
“We won the
state championship right out of the chute, but that's not because of me,” he
said. “That's because of what Terry had done.”
Current
Minneota seniors McKenzie Tolk and Natalie Rolbiecki plan to play volleyball at
Southwest State next year. Many high school players from Marshall, Minneota and
other schools in southwest Minnesota go to camps at Southwest State and watch
the Mustangs play.
“We have a
great relationship,” Westby said of the ties that bring together the college
and high school programs. “In most college towns, the high school program and
the college program are completely separate. But in Marshall, our college team
and our high school team work so closely together, it's just been great for both
the college and the high school.”
Fruin said
of Culhane, “That man deserves all the recognition and everything because he
has done a lot. I’ve heard so many Terry stories about how he's got a big
heart. He's a tough coach, but he's got a big heart, too.”
--MSHSL media specialist John Millea has been the leading voice of
Minnesota high school activities for decades. Follow him on Twitter @MSHSLjohn
and listen to "Preps Today with John Millea” wherever you get podcasts.
Contact John at jmillea@mshsl.org
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