Morningside’s men’s volleyball team will go into the Midwest Conference Tournament with the momentum of four wins in its last five matches.

Morningside’s men’s volleyball team received a school-record tying serving performance from Ian Leibitzke when it defeated Dordt 25-20, 17-25, 25-17, 26-28, 15-12 in Wednesday’s regular season finale in Sioux City.

Leibitzke, a senior playing in the final home match of his Mustang career, shredded the Defenders’ court coverage with five ace serves to tie a Morningside single-match record.

The Mustangs improved their record to 9-22 heading into the Midwest Conference Tournament slated for April 8 and 9 at a site to be determined. The Mustangs finished with a 6-4 record in the Midwest Conference, including a 4-2 mark in the Northern Division. Morningside will take some momentum into the conference tourney with two straight victories and four wins in its last six matches.

Morningside displayed a balanced attack in the win against the Defenders. Raul Rivera Rojas and Braden Hall each slammed 13 kills to share team honors, while Jimmy Aschenbrenner and Cody Wood also finished in double figures with 11 and 10 kills, respectively. The 11 kills by the freshman Aschenbrenner was his season’s high, while the senior Wood finished just one off his season’s best.

Mustang freshman Caden Toben dealt a match-high 30 assists and was joined in double figures by Elijah Magat with 17 assists.

Cade DuVel led the Mustangs’ defensive court coverage with a season’s high 16 digs, while Rivera Rojas and Hall had 14 and 13 digs, respectively, to finish with kill/dig double-doubles.

Jacob Brand led the Mustangs’ blocking effort with one solo block and four block assists to go along with six kills when the Mustangs were on the offensive. Hall was next with one solo block and three block assists.

Box Score