'A dream come true': Gulf Breeze beach volleyball wins state championship in second season

Sydney Sutter served the ball on match point in the final pairing.

Players on the first court had just won to tie the match, 2-2, and the third pairing – Sutter and Allie Hepworth, both sophomores – posted an incredible comeback in the second set, trailing 20-19 at one point, to come back and win.

It was going to come down to a third set. Whoever could get to 15 points first.

So, Sutter prayed.

“I prayed a lot that God would give us the energy and everything we needed to push through,” Sutter said. “I was definitely a little bit nervous. Music helped me calm down. My teammates helped me calm down. It just made me Zen.”

Hepworth and Sutter led 12-7 before Berkeley Prep called timeout and started to make a comeback. It got to 12-11, still in favor of the Dolphins, before Gulf Breeze stayed on top, 13-12. A point later, Sutter served the ball.

A bump from the Bucs sent it to the right side of the court. A set from the right pushed it over to the left. And a spike went into the net.

Gulf Breeze did it. Hepworth and Sutter sealed the set, 15-12; won the game, 2-1; and won the match, 3-2. They immediately ran to each other and hugged. For a moment, time stood still.

“That moment just felt so surreal,” Sutter said. “That hug was just a huge relief. All of the worries and everything with stress on our shoulders was just completely melted.”

A moment doesn’t last forever, however. The rest of the Gulf Breeze team immediately ran onto Court 2 at Florida State University and dogpiled the winning pair. The Dolphins achieved perfection, a 22-0 season ending with a state title.

“That just made time go back to normal. It’s an unreal moment,” Sutter said. “I can’t describe it better than that.”

But what does last forever? The title that the Dolphins now hold: the 2024 FHSAA Beach Volleyball State Champions.

“I think it’s hit a little bit, with all the fireworks and the medal around my neck,” Gulf Breeze head coach Chelsea Kroll said. “But … there’s no words, really.”

“Every time we went to practice, every time we went anywhere as a team, we always talked about it and always just went for it,” senior Addisyn Tolbert said. “It’s so surreal to finally the medal in my hand right now. It’s insane.”

Battling through adversity

It wasn’t just Sunday afternoon that brought some unexpected difficulties to the Dolphins through their quest to become state champions.

On Friday, storms and tornadoes ripped through the Tallahassee area and the rest of the Florida Panhandle. FSU’s campus took a direct hit from a tornado, and there was a lot of damage. A lot of the area was without power – including where Gulf Breeze was staying.

Gulf Breeze was scheduled to start its tournament at 8 a.m. on Friday. With the storms, the entire schedule got postponed. The Dolphins had to wait until 7 a.m. on Saturday to start their journey. It was all too similar to last year – where things were postponed due to weather, but not this badly.

“There was stuff that happened last year that was unexpected, and we thought we came into this weekend prepared for the unexpected,” Kroll said. “And then more unexpected things happened.”

Friday turned into a rest day for Gulf Breeze.

“Since we didn’t have phones, we weren’t on social media just scrolling endlessly. We were playing board games, a lot of team bonding. That just made us closer than we already are, because we’re already like a family,” Sutter said. But we used that rest day as energy to push forward to this.”

After two sweeps over St. John Lutheran and Hagerty to conclude the Saturday matches, volleyball became Gulf Breeze’s escape in a chaotic weekend. Then they entered Sunday with a 3-1 win over St. Thomas Aquinas in the state semifinals.

Then came the championship match that went to five games – just the fourth time all year that a match would be decided by a fifth game for the Dolphins.

“All week leading up to this weekend, I kept reminding them, ‘Hey, we can’t walk into this weekend expecting to go 3-0 every time.’ I was like, ‘We have to be comfortable going 3-2, maybe going to three sets, being down, all of the things that are not comfortable whenever you’re in those situations,” Kroll said. “We have to make sure we’re OK with handling that kind of burden of where the state championship lies on your court.”

There’s a fairytale ending somewhere in this story. A year ago, Sutter – who was playing with Carmyn Ferguson – didn’t get the chance to finish her game, as another court lost and sealed the match for New Smyrna Beach, ending Gulf Breeze’s season.

This year, the state championship, literally, came down to Sutter – now partnered with Hepworth.

“I would not want anybody but those two in that position,” Kroll said.

After a hard-fought battle, with Gulf Breeze coming out on top, all of the chaos turned into a good form – celebration.

“Just to see all the hard work come to fruition, it’s a dream come true,” Kroll said.

“Knowing that (volleyball) is our escape and we get such a high reward out of it, it’s just so good,” Tolbert said. “Especially with (Sutter and Hepworth) being younger and how mature they are, with their knowledge of volleyball, it just sets our program up for success in the future.”

Then came the fireworks. The medals. The cheers. The trophy. And, what can only be assumed, it was thrilling bus ride home.

“It’s mind boggling,” Sutter said. “This team has worked so hard, and we fought and pushed each other all season. We earned this.”

Final Game Scores

Pair 1: Estelle Reese/Delaney Rich – Berkeley Prep 2, Gulf Breeze 0 (13-21, 16-21)

Pair 2: Bella Satterwhite/Riley Bloomberg – Gulf Breeze 2, Berkeley Prep 0 (21-10, 21-6)

Pair 3: Sydney Sutter/Allie Hepworth – Gulf Breeze 2, Berkeley Prep 1 (16-21, 21-18, 15-12)

Pair 4: Carmyn Ferguson/Izzy Beech – Berkeley Prep 2, Gulf Breeze 1 (8-12, 21-16, 14-16)

Pair 5: Peyton McDonald/Addisyn Tolbert – Gulf Breeze 2, Berkeley Prep 0 (21-18, 21-13)

Ben Grieco is a sports reporter for the Pensacola News Journal. He can be reached on X (@BenGriecoSports) and via email at BGrieco@gannett.com. Liam Rooney of the Tallahassee Democrat contributed to this story.

This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: Gulf Breeze beach volleyball wins state championship over Berkeley Prep