As players walked onto the court in celebration following Lee Meyer's kill to end Friday's match, coach Joel Walton turned away from the court to look into the Worthen Arena crowd.
It didn't take the 11th-year head coach long to find the man he was trying to congratulate.
With his wife standing next to him and wearing the same blue Volleycards track jacket he wore throughout the 1990s, Ball State University's original men's volleyball coach Don Shondell stood clapping.
Forty-five years since fighting his athletic director to make men's volleyball a varsity sport, Shondell continued to clap for about five minutes after witnessing the program's newest milestone.
Ball State swept the Milwaukee School of Engineering to win its 1,000th match in program history - a feat Shondell said he did not even consider a possibility when the team played its first match as a varsity team in 1964.
"I never even thought about it," Shondell said. "I don't think about wins at all."
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MEN'S VOLLEYBALL: Road to 1,000
MEN'S VOLLEYBALL: Road to 1,000
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