The Memorial volleyball team has seen all along where its regular-season was going to end.

They also expected every last bit of the difficulty they needed to survive in order to end it how they wanted.

The Mustangs capped an unbeaten District 19-5A season Tuesday night, wrestling the district championship away from six-time defending winner Stratford, 18-25, 25-21, 25-22, 23-25, 15-10 in front of a standing-room only crowd at Stratford.

Memorial senior Sidney Stewart had a school-record 25 kills in the match, which lasted a shade more than two hours and ended with the Mustangs (33-5 overall, 14-0 district) clinching their first championship since 2000.

“It’s really exciting to be the first team in six years to beat them. We were very determined at it feels great,” Stewart said. “This is such a huge rivalry and so much emotion is put in the game. We knew we’d pull it out. We were excited but we were calm at the same time.”

The teams traded serve nine times to start the fifth set. Memorial grabbed a 6-4 lead, then Stratford (22-11, 12-2) scored three straight points to erase that and mustered a 10-all tie when Memorial was called for palming. But the Mustangs’ Shawn Hindman immediately erased any thoughts of a rally when she dropped a kill between three Spartans defenders.

Nicole Naidus served out the set, sealing the win with an ace and sending the Mustangs into a delirious celebration.

“I’d have liked to have been out of here in three (sets) but I knew it was gonna be that type of match tonight, especially coming here,” Memorial coach Beth Gammill said. “We started passing better as the night went on and got a little more focused on getting in our passing schemes so we could get into our hitting schemes.”

Stratford controlled the first set but Memorial stayed a nose ahead in each of the next two, holding Stratford in a bay in what often turned into a battle of wills between the two front rows. The Spartans got within a point four times in the second set but never took the lead, setting the tone for the rest of the night.

The Spartans rolled to leads of 9-4 and 17-11 in the fourth set, leading by as much as 22-14 before Memorial mounted a late run.

Jennifer Jordan had 20 kills and Mary Ellen Luck added 16 digs and 10 kills for the Spartans.

“They (Stratford) were a lot more consistent this time,” Stewart said. “They served a ton of balls out (in the teams’ previous meeting Sept. 28) and we fed off that. This time we weren’t running the pace of the game. … They got better and we didn’t play as well.”

But that's likely not what Memorial will remember Tuesday night for.

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