NEW ULM — Representing Minnesota Valley Lutheran’s winningest volleyball team in school history, senior middle hitter Mara Weisensel ended her final season in Charger blue with numerous records and awards to show for it.

Helping guide the Chargers to a 24-win campaign, Weisensel also was named the 2019 Tomahawk Conference Volleyball Player of the Year. She added another feather to her cap this week after being unanimously voted as the 2019 All-Journal Volleyball Player of the Year.

With the successful final year at MVL and the awards to show for it, Weisensel said that all of this just shows what kind of team she was on.

“It really just shows me that the season was a great season and the team worked really hard,” Weisensel said. “I really wouldn’t have been able to get [the awards] without my team behind me.”

The Chargers’ athletic, aggressive hitter ended the year with a single-season school record of 460 kills. She also finished with 917 career kills, passing Heather Danell’s previous school career mark of 696 kills.

Weisensel also finished the year with 84 blocks, giving her another school record of 241 career blocks, and she also had 10 blocks in a five-set road victory over New Ulm Cathedral on Sept. 24, giving her the single-match school blocks record. That was also the match that saw Weisensel pass Danell for the career kills record.

In addition to those records, Weisensel started the season off in a big way by setting the single-match school kills record with 33 against Sleepy Eye St. Mary’s on Aug. 27 in a four-set win in Sleepy Eye.

Looking at the impressive list of records, Weisensel said that the career kills record was the one record she was most excited about as it also helped MVL setter Maddie Pearson set the school record for career set assists in the process.

“I think the one I was most geared up for was the most career kills,” she said. “It was the first one that I learned that we could get, that I could get, and along with that came Maddie getting her career sets, so it was kind of like a group effort for us.”

Pearson ended her senior year with 802 set assists, a school record, and ended her career with a school record of 1,847 set assists. The duo of Weisensel and Pearson also shared The Journal’s Aug. 25-Sept. 1 Athlete of the Week award.

Weisensel said that she and the team owed a lot of their success this year to Pearson.

“I think we really helped each other grow, we really both got Player of the Year,” Weisensel said of Pearson. “I wouldn’t be the hitter that I am and we wouldn’t be the team we were without Maddie. It’s really just a good relationship.”

While the Chargers ended the season with a five-set loss to BOLD in the Section 2A playoffs at New Ulm High School, they didn’t quit despite being down two sets to none. That kind of fight-to-the-end spirit the Chargers showed the Warriors was something that Weisensel was proud of all year.

“I think that we just never gave up,” Weisensel said. “Throughout the season, if there was something that we needed to work through, we wouldn’t give up on it. And I think that showed in our games, the ones where we fought back like at Cathedral, the BOLD game. And win or lose, we knew that we put our all into it.”

Before graduating from MVL, Weisensel will turn her attention to track and field in the spring. She’ll then head off to college next fall to continue her volleyball career.

She is currently undecided about where she’ll be playing volleyball next season but has a few schools at the top of her list.

2019 All-Journal Volleyball

First Team

1. Mara Weisensel, MH, MVL, Sr. — 45 (U)

2. Maddie Pearson, S, MVL, Sr. — 42

3. Sarah Kottke, MH, BLHS, Sr. — 35

4. Jill Thompson, OH, Nicollet, Sr. — 34

5. Eva Mark, S, Springfield, Sr. — 32

6. Kora Wahl, MH, Springfield, Sr. — 31

Second Team

7. Maggie Fliszar, OH, Cathedral, Sr. — 27

8. Emma Nelson, OH, MVL, Sr. — 20

9. Cylee Graff, OH, Springfield, Jr. — 19

10. Madison Mathiowetz, MH, St. Mary’s, So. — 15

11. Cora Eichten, MH, Wabasso, Sr. — 13

12. Hannah Panitzke, OH, GFW, Sr. — 10

Third Team

T13. Nora Windschill, OH, New Ulm, Sr. — 13

T13. Sarah Mohr, MH, Cathedral, Jr. — 13

15. Brittney Dittbenner, OH/MH, Sleepy Eye, Sr. — 6

T16. Shelby Ramirez, MH, GFW, Sr. — 3

T16. Sandy Flores, S, Sleepy Eye, Sr. — 3

T16. Kaity Lee, Libero, GFW, Sr. — 3

(U) denotes unanimous selection

Honorable Mentions: Natalie Yackley, S, New Ulm, So.; Julia Schweiss, MH, GFW, So.; Brynn Busse, S, GFW, Fr.