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Morgan head coach Kyle Komenda and his son, senior Jack Komenda, embrace following a 3-2 win over Grantsville for the 3A state boys volleyball championship played Thursday, May 8, 2025, at the UCCU Center in Orem.

CONNER BECKER, Standard-Examiner

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Morgan hoists its trophy following a 3-2 win over Grantsville for the 3A state boys volleyball championship played Thursday, May 8, 2025, at the UCCU Center in Orem.

CONNER BECKER, Standard-Examiner

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Morgan senior Madden Bell jumps to spike the ball toward Grantsville during the 3A state boys volleyball championship on Thursday, May 8, 2025, at the UCCU Center in Orem.

CONNER BECKER, Standard-Examiner

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Morgan sophomore Caleb Stephens sets up his serve during the 3A state boys volleyball championship on Thursday, May 8, 2025, at the UCCU Center in Orem.

CONNER BECKER, Standard-Examiner

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OREM — Jack Komenda reminded Morgan’s bench to hold their breath. They’d been here before.

Defeating No. 2 Salt Lake Academy in four sets a few hours earlier, the No. 3 Trojans were locked with No. 8 Grantsville, a team that’d previously knocked off top seed Ogden in the quarterfinals, in the match of their lives for the 3A state boys volleyball title.

“Keep going, take breaths,” Komenda said.

A raucous fourth set amassed 64 total points between parties, with Grantsville earning the 33-31 win and evening the match 2-2 in the process.

Morgan pulled it together 15-13 a set later for the program’s first state championship Thursday at Utah Valley University’s UCCU Center.

Morgan won the match in five sets: 23-25, 25-21, 25-21, 31-33, 15-13.

All too familiar, the title’s endless fourth set saw Morgan squander two match-point chances as the Cowboys refused to go down. It took a fifth set, played to 15 points instead of 25, for the Trojans to capitalize on a 13-10 edge.

Kevin Wangsgard’s match point sent the Trojans into a frenzy, as it should’ve. Morgan, a season before, finished third in the state’s first-ever sanctioned state championships in Orem.

The Trojans and Cowboys split two regular-season meetings, Grantsville claiming the first 3-2 in five sets at home and dropping the other 3-1 in four sets on the road. Morgan dropped the first set Thursday but answered, winning the next two.

A fifth set with Grantsville sent Jack’s father and Morgan’s head coach, Kyle Komenda, into a testy place watching his senior compete for program history before his eyes.

“I was like ‘Oh boy, I better hold it together,” Kyle Komenda said. “After they went to that fifth set, it was deja vu with these guys — they got us in that fifth set and he’d just laid everything on the floor, not just today but yesterday in that five-set match.”

Winning two straight, Morgan opened the fourth set down 7-3 and grappled with the Cowboys, led by Hunter Powell up front, through a 33-31 defeat to set up a title for whoever could recover for the fifth set.

Up 13-10, Jack Komenda and his three seniors smelled the summit.

In what the younger Komenda described as a pure “team effort,” Morgan’s final push cemented what they’d fallen short of a year ago on the same courts at UVU.

The moment means a great deal to Jack, who credits his father with steering him into the game and remaining committed to building yet another winning program at Morgan.

“He’s the one (who) brought me to play volleyball,” Jack Komenda said. “He’s been my coach throughout my entire life (and) I’m super grateful for him. … We built this team up from the ground, from the beginning of the season.”

The Trojans, with their first boys volleyball title in hand, finished their second season of the Komenda era 23-8 as the Region 13 runner-up. The first pair of Morgan teams has their head coach committed to keeping expectations sky high.

“There’s a legacy here and that’s why I agreed to coach this team,” Komenda said. “It’s a challenge I wanted to take, and it was our goal last season. We fell short, so that was our motto all year, and yeah, we finished it. It’s extremely satisfying, especially for those seniors.”

Connect with sports reporter Conner Becker via email at cbecker@standard.net and X @ctbecker.