ROBERTSDALE, Alabama—The Robertsdale Lady Golden Bears swept their way through the 2012 6A Area 3 volleyball tournament to claim the area championship with a final match-win over Daphne 25-17, 25-14, 25-14 Thursday night at Robertsdale High. Daphne's Lady Trojans and the Golden Bears will advance to the South Super Regional in Montgomery Next Friday and possibly Saturday to vie for a seed in the Elite Eight State Tournament.

The No. 10-Ranked G-Bears rose to 54-11 overall with a perfect area record of 10-0 to claim the regular season and area tournament title.

The regular-season, Area 3 standings pitted No. 2-seed Daphne against No. 3 Foley with DHS advancing with a 25-22, 25-23, 25-22 sweep. No. 4-seed Baldwin County faced off with Fairhope for the chance to play the hosts and No. 1- seeded Lady Bears who had the bye. The Lady Pirates lost the first game 25-19 then rallied to win 25-20, 25-20, 25-19. In the semifinals RHS eliminated Fairhope in three games 25-10, 25-15, 25-13.

RHS head coach Metta Roberts was pleased that her team played well enough to sweep and regain the area's tournament title for the first time since 2009. But also knows they will face some strong teams in the regional.

"Winning's always good. It feels good to get the area title again, outright," she said. "Fairhope won it last year and Daphne the year before with us the runner-up both times. We won the regular season both those years and won it all the year before that. But it's good to bring the tournament title back. The girls worked hard for it and are playing at a fairly high level. I think they played well through out the season.

"This should give them some extra confidence going into the Super Regional, but we have to raise that level up a notch or two to keep going. No doubt we'll see some stiffer competition, but we have been playing some really good teams to help us get better, but have not been able to beat them so far. Still, I think it's coming together for us at the right time and we have to go up there with the mind set that it's a must win for us every time."

For the tournament, Bethany Coley led the Lady Bears with 30 kills and 21 digs; Austin Richardson had 25 kills, 28 digs; Maddie Petite had 14 kills, 12 blocks; Beth Taylor had nine kills, 24 assists; Brooke McGhee scored 50 assists and Harley Volovecky added 16 digs for the Golden Bears.

Daphne's Suzanne Evans had 19 kills and nine digs; Katherine Barr added 15 kills, 27 digs; Taylor Wright had nine kills and 12 blocks; Taylor Pitt had seven kills, Jordyn Valrie had three kills; Audrey Walding had 28 assists, 10 digs, Taylor Barnette had 20 assists, three kills, six digs and Jordan Filotei picked up 23 digs.

RHS faces the runner-up of Area 7 Friday at 4:15 p.m. The Lady Trojans play at 6:45 p.m. Friday night. Only first-round winners advance to the Saturday rounds.