DWU's Ady Dwight honored with NAIA all-tournament award

Marcus Traxler, The Daily Republic, Mitchell, S.D.
·3 min read

Dec. 7—SIOUX CITY, Iowa. — Dakota Wesleyan University junior middle blocker Ady Dwight was selected to the NAIA all-tournament team on Tuesday, Dec. 6 at the conclusion of the national championship match at the Tyson Events Center.

DWU finished the season at 25-8, bowing out with a quarterfinal round sweep at the hands of Great Plains Athletic Conference rival Midland. It was the first time DWU has advanced to the national quarterfinals in the NAIA volleyball tournament.

In Sioux City, Dwight had 42 kills in three matches, including hitting .385 in the opening pool play sweep of Southern Oregon on Nov. 30, and she finished with 16 total blocks and 50.5 points scored. For the entire NAIA tournament, she finished with 59 kills and hit .288 with 18 total blocks in the four matches, including the 3-0 opening-round sweep of Kansas Wesleyan at the Corn Palace on Nov. 19.

The NAIA tournament ended Tuesday with No. 3 Jamestown (N.D.) defeating No. 4 Corban (Ore.) in five sets for the school's first national championship in any sport. The Jimmies finished 37-2 on the season, with Anna Holen earning the tournament's MVP honors on the strength of a career-high 23 kills and 35 digs in the title match.

Jamestown is only the second GPAC team to win an NAIA volleyball title, and the first since Hastings in 2016, but the conference has had a a national finalist in four of the last seven seasons. It was also the fifth NAIA championship match in the last seven seasons to go five sets.

In other award news for DWU, Dwight and teammate Madeline Else were also NAIA American Volleyball Coaches Association all-West Central region selections for the season, with Dwight receiving attacker of the year honors in the region. Dwight, from Langford, finished the season No. 2 nationally in kills per set (4.68), third in total kills (571) and pointed scored (640) and No. 1 points per set (5.2). She ranked No. 16 nationally in hitting percentage (.343). A career .343 hitter, she has logged 1,285 kills, which is fifth-most in DWU history.

Else, a senior from Holstein, Iowa, wraps her Tiger career ranking No. 3 in all-time career assists with 3,733. She had 1,432 assists during the 2022 season, which was fifth-most nationally and ranked No. 2 in assists per set (11.74).

On win percentage, it was DWU's third-best season in school history and the best of the rally-scoring era for Tiger volleyball. DWU was 25-8, winning .757% of its games, a mark only surpassed by a 42-6 season in 1989 (.875) and a 47-6 campaign in 1990 (.824).

Hanna Reiff, DWU's senior libero, also etched her name into Tiger volleyball history by finishing with 1,737 digs at DWU. That figure ranks as third-most for DWU, and she finished with 1,806 digs for her college career, which began at Northern State.