DAPHNE, Ala. —As sure as the leaves turn out in late October, The Lady Admirals of Bayside Academy turn up in Pelham. The No.1 ranked, nine-time defending state champs zipped through the sub-state qualifier Thursday at home with a 3-0 victory over Marbury and advanced to the 3A Elite Eight state tournament set to begin Wednesday at 2 p.m. at the Pelham Civic Center. Bayside will face Madison Academy in the first round.

MA defeated Carbon Hill 15-25, 22-25, 14-25 to advance while BA won 25-2, 25-10, 25-6 and improved to 60-7 overall. The Lady Admirals are on track to set a school season record of 63 match wins, a new win-streak record of 37 matches, a 10th consecutive state title and a 20th state title overall in volleyball. Only McGill-Toolen Catholic and Bayside own 19 state titles. The Mc-T Dirty Dozen also made the Elite Eight this year in the 6A classification.

Bayside coach Ann Schilling said the pressure is always there and each year, each team is different and has to find a way through, but their one-match-at-a-time approach seems to be working along with steady improvement over the season.

“We have been talking about one match at a time. We are pretty focused, I think, right now. They have done well, but we just have to keep it up. We’ve accomplished a lot but we haven’t accomplished our main goal yet, and that is to win the 3A state championship this year. We are not going talk about how great they are until they do that.“

Based not only on their record, but who they have played and beaten, this could be the most successful team in Bayside history. Two more wins will tie them with the 2002 Lady Admiral team at 62 which started the nine-year championship reign. That team also beat McGill-Toolen and St. Paul's, but this year both are ranked No. 1, Mc-T in 6A and the defending state champion Lady Saints in 5A. Bayside 2011 also defeated several other top-10 teams in 6A, 5A and 4A. Schilling said one thing that pleased her most was how the team regrouped after an early slump and dedicated themselves to be as good as possible.

"They started out strong, but then hit a wall. I don't know exactly when, but they took it upon themselves to push hard and they have all gotten better, individually and as a team around the St. Paul's match at St. Paul's. I think they turned a corner and just found a groove and got into sync around then. You know we have four kids who can really just put the ball down on the other side. My big hitters Gabby (Deshotel) and Virginia (Pittman) are playing big and have matured a lot. They have confidence in Sydney (Chandler, setter) to put the ball in the right spot and the defense behind, especially Victoria (Smith, libero) and Jhalen (Caffey) and Morgan

(Delaney) to make good passes. And my other outside, my younger hitter, Harper (Morrison), has just come on strong and she knows she has the green light and Syd is going to go to her when it's right. I guess what I see is a lot of confidence in each other out there as well as self confidence. But we have some other kids who can come in and play, too. So they have all worked hard and I'm really proud of them all. But we still have work to do."

And then they practiced.

Deshotel had 12 kills, 3 blocks; Pittman 4 kills, 6 aces and 4 digs; Caffey  and Delaney had 6 kills each, Morrison had 3 kills, Smith added 5 aces with 10 digs and Chandler had 27 assists.