ROUNDUP: High school sports top performers week of May 12-18

SAINT CLOUD – Already it’s postseason time in central Minnesota. The St. Cloud area was home to tennis section tournaments last week – the whole of team sections and the first part of individual tournaments, which will be completed this week.

With Becker's boys winning the Section 8-2A team tournament on May 17, there are several Bulldogs on the list for the top athletes for the week of May 12-18. Foley will also compete at state as a team after winning Section 6-1A for the second year in a row.

The top performers list aims to weekly honor athletes from Albany, Becker, Foley, Holdingford, Kimball, ROCORI, Royalton, Sartell-St. Stephen, Sauk Rapids-Rice, St. Cloud Apollo, St. Cloud Cathedral, St. Cloud Tech, and St. John’s Prep competing in lacrosse, tennis and track and field. Stats were obtained through the teams or online.

Boys lacrosse

Mason Anderson 

Sartell/Sauk Rapids junior attacker

Still streaky, the boys Storm’n Sabres started off the week on a bad 19-2 loss against St. Michael-Albertville, but bounced back with section wins over Becker on May 16 and the St. Cloud Crush on May 17. Sartell/Sauk Rapids held both the Bulldogs and Crush to seven goals and scored 14 and nine goals in the pair of games.

Mason Anderson had a goal in each game, with goal his assist of senior Kyan Rieder being the only two scores against the Knights. He also had four assists in the 14-7 win over Becker and three in the 9-7 win over St. Cloud.

Montey Sanborn 

Sartell/Sauk Rapids junior midfielder

Montey Sanborn tied with Anderson for most points scored on Sartell/Sauk Rapids from May 12-18, but Sanborn scored more goals. The Storm’n Sabre had 11 points on the week, seven of them goals. Although Sanborn wasn’t credited with any points against STMA, he had five goals against Becker and two against St. Cloud. The scores were paired with two assists each night. Sanborn did have five ground balls against STMA and 10 on the week.

Dylan Smith 

Sartell/Sauk Rapids junior goaltender

Dylan Smith’s biggest blemish was the 19 goals given up against St. Michael Albertville. The junior was peppered with 36 shots in the game, saving 17. He had 15 saves on 22 shots in the next two games, recording save percentages of .682, above his season average of .599.

Girls lacrosse

Phoenix Novotny 

St. Cloud sophomore goaltender

St. Cloud won three games last week with Phoenix Novotny in net. The sophomore made seven saves May 14 against St. Paul Academy and May 17 against Sartell/Sauk Rapids. On May 16 against Big Lake Novotny had four saves. Novotny and the Crush won the three games by a combined 46-6. Novotny had a save percentage of .750.

The Crush have one game remaining in the regular season, at 5 p.m. Thursday against Becker at St. Cloud Tech.

Claire Staudinger 

St. Cloud junior attacker

Claire Staudinger led St. Cloud’s point total last week, picking up two goals and two assists in both the 15-3 win over St. Paul Academy and the 14-2 win over Big Lake. Staudinger also had a hat trick and three assists against the Storm’n Sabres.

Boys tennis

Zach Bengtson 

Becker senior individual player

Tennis was the first sport to play sections in Minnesota. Two local teams qualified for state and several local individuals competed in the section tournaments last week. Several individuals went undefeated, including Zach Bengtson of Becker, who qualified for the Class 1A state tournament as a team on May 17.

Becker played three team Section 8-2A matches last week, beating Buffalo, Sartell and then Monticello in the championship. Bengtson and the Bulldogs’ two other individuals did not lose a match, though Bengtson dropped his first set of the week 7-5 to Sam Shaffer of Buffalo and another 7-5 to Ryan Schyma of Monticello. He bounced back losing just one game in his final match of the week.

Braden Bierscheid 

Sartell senior doubles player

Braden Bierscheid was one of three players undefeated in doubles matches for Sartell. He was partnered with one of them for the first match of the week, junior Isaiah Williams. En route to Sartell beating St. Cloud in that pre-section meet May 13, Bierscheild and Williams took down Jair and Jace Wucherer of the Crush 7-5, 6-3.

As a team, Sartell then beat Bemidji 6-1 in the quarterfinals of Section 8-2A the same day. The Sabres’ team season ended with a loss to Becker on the Bulldogs’ path to the championship. Bierscheid, however, kept winning with Adam Paulson. They beat Bemidji’s pair 6-1 in both sets and were one of two wins for Sartell in the semifinal, beating Brock Herdina and Carter Ager 6-4, 6-2.

Alex Burns 

Sartell eighth grade doubles player

Eighth-grader Alex Burns was successful on two different doubles teams last week in three matches. Against the Crush, Burns and freshman Will Gerads paired for a doubles victory over Carl Shobe and Phineas Putnam 6-1, 7-5. Burns then picked up two section wins with junior Isaiah Williams – 6-3, 6-4 over Bemidji’s Thomas Harris and Blake Friese and 6-4, 6-3 over Becker’s Jon Drury and Nathan Weiss.

Troy Nuest 

Becker sophomore individual

Like Becker’s top individual – Bengtson – No. 2 Troy Nuest was undefeated in solos. He played a crisp set of matches, winning six sets by more than two games. His total of games won-lost was 36-11.

Landon Peterson 

Becker sophomore individual player

Becker’s final solo player, Landon Peterson, lost just one set, his first to Wil Schmidt of Buffalo. Peterson battled, taking the score to 7-6 before holding his opponent to just one game win the rest of the match. He allowed his Monticello opponent to score five points and Peterson beat Jaden Otto from Sartell 6-0 and 6-4.

Charlie Streit  

St. Cloud junior individual player

He needed an extra serve against Sartell’s Adam Paulson and Moorhead’s Brody Hansen and he needed a 10-5 tiebreaker against Alexandria’s Owen Godfrey, but Charlie Streight was undefeated in three solo matches for the St. Cloud Crush last week. As a team the Crush fell out of the Section 8-2A meet in the second round, losing 6-1 to the Cardinals.

Starting with the final regular-season match, a 6-1 loss to Sartell on May 13, Streight was the only St. Cloud player to win. He beat Paulson 6-1, 7-5. In the first round of the tournament the Crush beat Moorhead 6-1 and Streit won 6-3, 7-5, playing up in the second slot usually held by junior Josh Vogel. Vogel was back for the Alex match May 13 and Streit won at his normal position, beating Godfrey 3-6, 6-4, 10-5.

Isaiah Williams 

Sartell junior doubles player

Williams won three-straight doubles matches for Sartell, first over a pair from Tech with Bierscheid, then with Burns over teams from Buffalo and Becker.

Previous week: ROUNDUP: Top performing high school athletes from the week of April 21-27

DAPE students compete at track meet: St. Cloud Tech hosts first DAPE track meet since pandemic

Midseason all-star list–check the stats: Who's been the best high school baseball player so far this year? Here's the top 20 picks

Contact reporter Reid Glenn at rglenn@stcloud.gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on St. Cloud Times: St. Cloud Times high school sports top performers week of May 12-18