State Boys Volleyball: Wasatch loaded and ready for 5A final
Lehi marches on to 6A title match
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- JJ Serre of Wasatch (35) celebrates a point during a 5A boys volleyball state semifinal match against Olympus at the UCCU Center on Thursday, May 7, 2026.
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- Lehi’s Rigdon Hansen (left) and Kyson Ririe (14) celebrate a point during the 6A boys volleyball state tournament at the UCCU Center on Wednesday, May 6, 2026.
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- Lehi’s Ashton Shewell takes a swing in the 6A boys volleyball state tournament at the UCCU Center on Wednesday, May 6, 2026.
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- Graydon Fleitas (11) and Seth Tate of Wasatch put up a block against Olympus in a 5A boys volleyball semifinal match at the UCCU Center on Thursday, May 7, 2026.
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- Members of the Wasatch boys volleyball team celebrate a point in a 5A state semifinal match against Olympus at the UCCU Center on Thursday, May 7, 2026.
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- Maple Mountain’s Taft Hillman sets the ball in a 5A state semifinal match against Bountiful at the UCCU Center on Thursday, May 7, 2026.
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- Lehi’s Ashton Shewell dives for a ball in the 6A boys volleyball state tournament at the UCCU Center on Wednesday, May 6, 2026.
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- Lone Peak’s Brady Holt (17) takes a swing in the 6A boys volleyball state tournament at the UCCU Center on Wednesday, May 6, 2026.
The Wasatch boys volleyball team is hunting for a state championship.
No. 4 Olympus didn’t make it easy but the top-seeded Wasps (25-1) prevailed in Thursday’s semifinals 3-1 (27-25, 20-25, 25-21, 25-21) at Utah Valley’s UCCU Center to advance to the 5A title match.
“We want to be the hunter and not the prey,” senior outside hitter JJ Serre said. “You’ve just got to stand and attack always and not take anything for granted. There’s a reason other teams are in the tournament, and we’ve just got to play our game.”
The Wasps hustled through the first set and survived extra points for a 27-25 win. Olympus evened things up with a 25-20 win in the second set. A series of Olympus errors pushed the momentum to the other side in Set 3 and Wasatch took a 17-12 lead. It was 19-14 after Serre scored on a swing but the Titans pulled back to within two at 22-20. Two kills from Chase Billeter pushed Wasatch the 25-21 win and a 2-1 lead in the match.
Set 3 was all Wasps, with a Billeter kill leading to a 22-15 advantage. Olympus battled to within 24-21 but a Graydon Fleitas attack was too hot to handle and Wasatch earned the 25-21 victory.
“We haven’t faced a team this year that was as efficient as Olympus,” Wasps head coach Mike Wilton said. “They really made us earn our points. I like they were just relentless. They didn’t give us a lot of breathing room and it was really tough, especially those first two sets. I told the boys to just ride out the storm and there were going to be stretches where it didn’t look good, but we had to be OK with that and just be resilient.”
Billeter topped Wasatch with 19 kills and three blocks, followed by Serre with 17 kills and three blocks and Grant Hansen contributed 13 kills. Setter Nate Burton directed the efficient Wasps offense and added three blocks and three service aces.
Wasatch will take on No. 2 seed Bountiful in the finals. The Wasps beat the Redhawks 3-1 in Heber City on April 8 and also won a 3-1 decision in last year’s state semifinals.
The Wasps lost to No. 1 Maple Mountain in last year’s 5A final.
“It’s been a little bit of a different scenario for us,” Wasatch head coach Mike Wilton said. “Last year we were celebrating just getting to the championship because we knew the reality of facing that really good Maple Mountain team. This year we came in with the target on our backs and the boys have really tried to get in the right mindset to face that. They’re hunting everybody they face.”
Top-seed Lehi powers to 6A final
Ashton Shewell put it simply after his Pioneers swept No. 5 Mountain Ridge to advance to the 6A finals: “I just like to hit the ball.”
Shewell likes to shoot a ball, too, as one of the state’s top basketball players. But his spring sport has a pretty good upside as well. The 6-foot-4 junior blasted 28 kills with just five errors against the Sentinels, hitting over .500 to push Lehi into the 6A final with a sweep (25-14, 33-31, 25-22).
“Ashton, he thrives on our offensive diversity,” Lehi head coach Kolby Shewell said. “When he’s at his best is when nobody knows where he’s going to go, and when he’s determined, he’s unstoppable.”
The Pioneers (25-2) came out hot and thumped Mountain Ridge 25-14 in the first set. The second set was epic, the Sentinels fighting off a set point to tie things up at 25 by tooling the Lehi block. The extra points kept coming as the two teams continued to trade blows. At 31-31, a Mountain Ridge hitting error put the add in Lehi’s favor. On the next serve, the Pioneers forced another hitting error for the 33-31 victory.
“The key to winning that second set was to keep the momentum and the intensity,” Coach Shewell said. “Even thought it was point for point, we didn’t play timid and still had to push through. We’re tough when we bring that mentality.”
Set 3 was tied at 18 but Lehi took the match by finishing strong. A kill from Jonny Dustin made it 21-19, then a tip by Kyson Ririe and a swing from Shewell gave the Pioneers a 23-20 lead. Shewell got the set-winner on a slide attack and Lehi finished the sweep.
Bingham, the defending 6A champion, will be the Pioneers opponent in the final.
“We have to get prepared mentally,” Coach Shewell said. “We have to go in knowing we’re good and then defensively, we have to block well. Bingham has a solid team and we’ve got to be able to challenge their hitters.”
5A semifinals
No. 2 Bountiful def. No. 3 Maple Mountain 3-0
In the other 5A semifinal, Bountiful managed to close out strong in two close sets to move on to the finals.
The Redhawks won the first set 25-21 but Maple Mountain grabbed an 18-15 lead on a solo block from Taft Hillman. The set was tied at 21 but Bountiful scored four straight points, getting back-to-back kills from Landon Chism to take a 2-0 lead in the match.
Maple Mountain played well in Set 3 and a block from Abe Hawkins gave the Golden Eagles a 19-14 lead. But the RedHawks battled back and tied the set at 20-all with a block. Aidan Sanford’s kill pushed Bountiful to a 25-24 lead and the RedHawks blocked a Maple Mountain attack for the winner and the sweep.
The Golden Eagles (23-6) lost to Olympus 2-0 in the third-place match to finish fourth.
6A semifinals
No. 2 Bingham def. No. 3 Lone Peak 3-0
There was no stopping the defending state champion Miners, who rolled past the Knights in three sets.
Lone Peak was up to the task in Set 1, trailing 22-21 after a kill from Kilika Tafa. But Bingham’s No. 8 powered down a pair of kills and the Miners earned a 25-22 win.
Set 2 was all Bingham, which led 13-7 early and claimed a 25-17 victory for a 2-0 lead in the match.
Lone Peak trailed 18-11 in Set 3 before rallying to a 21-20 deficit. But once again, the Miners had all the moves down the stretch and a kill from No. 11 gave them the 25-22 win and the sweep.
The Knights (23-8) lost to Mountain Ridge in the third-place match and finished fourth.
Wednesday’s 6A results
On Wednesday, Lehi and Lone Peak cruised past their opponents to gain the semifinals.
The top-seeded Pioneers fell behind No. 16 seed Westlake in the first match of the day but got things going the right way and swept the Thunder 25-20, 25-9, 25-21. Dustin topped Lehi with 14 kills and Shewell added 13.
In the quarterfinals, Lehi scored another sweep (25-18, 25-21, 25-23) against No. 8 Cedar Valley. Shewell had 21 kills to lead the Pioneers offense.
“Today we came out a little flat to start, but then we picked it up,” Lehi Coach Shewell said. “We got behind against Westlake in the first set by about five points, but then we were able to relax and play our volleyball, and we went on a run. We just need to clean up a little bit. But overall, I like the way that we played, and we’re going to continue to hopefully play with a lot of energy and intensity.”
Lehi took a 21-16 lead in Set 1 after an Shewell kill and the 6-4 senior powered down two more attacks to push his team to the win. In Set 2, Shewell counted back-to-back blocks late in the set as Lehi took a 2-0 lead in the match.
Set 3 was extremely close and tied at 23 on a kill from Cedar Valley’s Larsen Lemusu. But Shewell countered with an bullet for a point and set point with pushed the Pioneers to the win.
“We have a really special group this year,” said setter Ty Reynolds, who led the Lehi offense with 41 assists. “We’re really close off the court, and that’s made us really close on the court, too. We’ve just been every day on the court. We’ve just been playing for each other, and it’s been super fun.”
No. 3 seed Lone Peak opened play at UVU by beating Region 3 foe American Fork for the third time this season, scoring a 25-12, 25-17, 25-19 sweep.
In the quarterfinals, the Knights powered past No. 6 seed Corner Canyon in a sweep (25-20, 25-17, 25-16). Tafa totaled 24 kills in the two matches (12 in each) and Brady Holt added 21.
