RedStorm places four on All-MSC teams
Rio Grande/MSC Sports Information
BOWLING GREEN, Ky. - The University of Rio Grande has placed four players on the 2024 All-Mid-South Conference men's volleyball teams.
The teams, along with individual award winners, were announced by MSC officials on Thursday afternoon prior to the start of the league's championship tournament.
Senior Caden Donaldson (Jackson, OH) was named to the First Team, while junior Tyler Miller-Bross (Loveland, OH), sophomore Mitch Bartecki (Valparaiso, IN) and freshman Otavio Tonolu (Campinas, Brazil) were all second team honorees.
The RedStorm finished the regular season with a 12-16 record overall and a 3-7 mark in conference play. Head coach Nick Rawls' club was seeded fourth in the six-team tournament.
Donaldson led Rio with 366 kills in regular season play, surpassing the 1,000-kill mark for his collegiate career in the process. He also led the team in kills per set (3.94) and attack percentage (.284), while ranking second in digs (153).
Miller-Bross led the team in blocks with 78 (11 solo, 67 assists), while ranking second in attack percentage among the team's regulars (.247), third in service aces (22) and fourth in kills (141).
Bartecki compiled a team-high 847 assists and was fourth in blocks (31 total--4 solo, 27 assists), while Tonoli tied for the team lead in service aces (23), was second in kills (214) and digs (153) and tied for second in blocks (36 total--5 solo, 31 assists).
Georgetown's (Ky.) Ryan Gunn was named the MSC Men's Volleyball Player of the Year by the conference coaches, while teammate Finn Heinemann was named Setter of the Year. Campbellsville's Andres Laboy was named the MSC Defender of the Year and Aleksa Plevaljcic earned Freshman of the Year honors.
Gunn recorded 317 kills in 25 matches for Georgetown and averaged 4.01 kills per set. His 4.01 kills per set lead the MSC and rank seventh in the NAIA. Gunn also leads the conference with a .349 attacking percentage and ranks seventh in the NAIA.
Heinemann totaled 632 assists and 9.9 assists per set in 18 matches this season. His 632 assists rank seventh in the MSC.
Plevaljcic totaled 606 assists in 23 matches in his freshman campaign for Campbellsville. He ranks fourth in the MSC in total assists.
Laboy led the Tigers with 529 digs and ranked first in the conference and in the NAIA in that category. He averaged 4.4 digs per set which leads the NAIA.
Georgetown's Jim Dwyer was voted the MSC Men's Volleyball Coach of the Year by his peers, while Midway's Julia Pagan was named the Assistant Coach of the Year.
Dwyer led Georgetown to its third-straight MSC regular season conference championship. The Tigers head into the tournament with a 22-6 record.
Pagan earns Assistant Coach of the Year honors for the first time in her career.
Fourteen players were named to the first team while 15 players earned second team honors.
Joining Donaldson and the major award winners on the First Team were Georgetown's CJ Bride, Krzysztof Kowalski and Tyree Wesley; Campbellsville's JoVeaun Banks and John-Marcos Gonzalez; Cumberland (Tenn.) University's Caleb Ginnings, Luka Illic and Jacob Whyte; and Brescia University's Tuna Konukcu.
Along with Rio Grande's trio of second team selections, the remainder of the unit included Georgetown's Michal Bak and Adam Szewinski; Campbellsville's Denzel Madrigal and Alonzo Vega; Cumberland University's Kix Ferrell, Alexander Heuer, Kaden Kuehler and Austin Smalley; Brescia's Meric Akovali, Owen Collitt and Mustafa Yildiz; and Joseph Boujaoude from Midway University.
The league also announced its Scholar-Athlete and Champions of Character teams.
Rio Grande was represented on the Scholar team by Bartecki, Donaldson and the junior duo of Sam Kaylor (Lewis Center, OH) and Seth Mohr (Canton, OH).
The student-athletes recognized on the Champions of Character Team were nominated by their coaches based on their leadership on campus and in the community while demonstrating the five core character values of the NAIA.
Rio's honoree was An Nguyen (Chillicothe, OH).