Volleyball Today: Patriot League tourney begins; AVCA, NCAA RPI updates
In this edition of Volleyball Today, we’ve got the Patriot League Championship beginning Tuesday, the AVCA poll, an NCAA RPI update with implications, the passing of Matt McShane, a firing, a statue for WKU’s Travis Hudson and info on the Laguna Beach Open:
NCAA volleyball Tuesday
Postseason is upon us.
The Patriot League conference tournament gets underway when sixth-seeded Lehigh goes to No. 3 American and No. 5 Loyola Maryland is at No. 4 Army West Point. The semifinals are Friday at Colgate with the highest advancing seed playing second-seeded Bucknell and the other winner facing No. 1 Colgate.
There are four matches in The Summit League, where South Dakota State (14-1) holds a one-game lead on Omaha (13-2). South Dakota State is at South Dakota, while Omaha goes to Kansas City. Denver is at Oral Roberts and North Dakota is at North Dakota State as the regular-season concludes. The conference tournament starts Sunday in Kansas City.
The Ohio Valley Conference has a similar situation. Southeast Missouri (12-3) holds a one-game lead on Lindenwood (12-4) and is up two games on Little Rock (11-5). Southeast Missouri is home for SIUE, Lindenwood is at Little Rock, Morehead State goes to Southern Indiana, Tennessee State is at Eastern Illinois and Tennessee Tech is at UT Martin.
The same teams face off Wednesday and the conference tourney begins Sunday.
In the Missouri Valley, Murray State is at Belmont and UIC is at Valparaiso.
The Mountain West has third-place Fresno State (11-5) at San Jose State (12-5). Idle Colorado State leads at 12-4.
There were two SWAC matches Monday as Texas Southern swept Grambling and Alabama State did the same to Southern.
AVCA top 25
Much like the VolleyballMag Super 16 Media Poll, there was little movement at the top of the AVCA Division I Women’s Volleyball Poll. The top 10 spots stayed the same with the first change coming at No. 11, where Kansas moved up a spot. No one dropped out.
Click here for the complete AVCA top 25.
NCAA RPI through Sunday
The computer rankings are not the be-all end-all when it comes to the NCAA Tournament bracket, but it gives a pretty good idea of how the field of 64 will look. What matters most are the top four seeds (if they win their first two matches they get to play at home for the third and fourth rounds), the top 16 (you get to host the first two rounds), and then the teams in the 40s, who hope for at-large bids.
All that being said, the top four at Nebraska, Pittsburgh, Louisville and Creighton. The rest of the top 16 shows Stanford, Penn State, SMU, Wisconsin, Arizona State, Kentucky, Kansas, Texas, Utah, Dayton, TCU and BYU. The next four are USC, Oregon, Florida, Baylor.
A few conference notes: The ACC has 10 in the top 47, the Big Ten has nine in the top 33, the Big 12 has seven in the top 46, and the SEC has 11 in the top 49.
Most conferences will get just one team in the tournament. Exceptions are the Big East, where certainly Creighton and RPI 24 Marquette get in and the West Coast Conference, where RPI 26 Loyola Marymount is a lock and RPI 41 San Diego is a strong probability.
Others that could get more than one if the favorites are upset include the Atlantic 10 (RPI 14 Dayton), Conference USA (RPI 36 UTEP, RPI 53 Western Kentucky), Big West (RPI 37 Hawai’i), Summit League (RPI 31 South Dakota State, Missouri Valley (RPI 39 Northern Iowa), Horizon League (RPI 44 Wright State) and Ivy League RPI 48 Yale).
Some numbers to consider about the chances of upsets: Dayton has won 21 in a row and finished with a two-game lead in the A10; WKU won twice at UTEP, finished with a two-game lead and has won 21 in a row; and UNI has won 17 in a row and won the MVC by one game over Drake (RPI 58).
Matt McShane passes away
Matt McShane, whose career included being head volleyball coach at Air Force and as an aassistant and then head coach at Cal, has died.
John Kessel posted about his passing on Facebook, but we have no other details at this time.
McShane, who played at UC Santa Barbara then on the men’s club team at BYU, was a USA national team assistant coach and also was an assistant at Utah, New Mexico and BYU.
UNCW fires coach Dottie Hampton
UNC Wilmington made the announcement Monday that fifth-year coach Dottie Hampton has been let go after the Seahawks finshed 7-18, 4-14 in the CAA. She also coached beach.
UNCW has been to the NCAA Tournament once, in 2015.
WKU plans Travis Hudson statue
His success is well documented and there are few better guys in our sport than Western Kentucky’s Travis Hudson, who is in his 30th year on the job. And WKU will recognize that with a statue of him in 2025. This is from the WKU news release:
BOWLING GREEN, Ky. – Director of Athletics Todd Stewart announced that legendary WKU Volleyball Coach Travis Hudson will be forever immortalized at Diddle Arena with a statue to be unveiled during the 2025 season. The announcement came on the night that Hudson was inducted into the WKU Athletics Hall of Fame.
“… As a result, we have also commissioned renowned sculptor Russ Faxon to design and produce a life-size statue of Travis that will be unveiled in the fall of 2025. He joins Ed Diddle as the only individuals in WKU Athletics history to have a statue in their honor, and I congratulate him on this truly deserved recognition.”
Hudson is in his 30th season on The Hill and joined WKU’s Athletics Hall of Fame on Saturday night. He has amassed 777 career wins, surpassing Ed Diddle for the second-most among any Hilltopper coach in a single sport (Diddle owns 1,030 total head coaching victories among the four sports he coached at WKU). Hudson has led his Hilltoppers to 33 Conference Championships, 16 NCAA Tournament appearances (including the 2020-21 Sweet 16), been named Conference Coach of the Year 11 times and AVCA South Region Coach of the Year seven times, had 64 first-team all-conference honorees, 12 All-Americans (including four, four-time All-Americans), 11 Conference Players of the Year, seven Freshmen of the Year, seven Defensive Players of the Year, six South Region Players of the Year and five Setters of the Year.
Click here for the complete news release.
Laguna Open begins Friday
The pro beach tournament begins with the qualifier on Friday, modified pool play and the start of playoffs on Saturday, and it finishes on Sunday.
The top women’s seed is the pair of Julia Scoles and Teegan Van Gunst. The second seed is Carly Kan and Devanne Sours and the third is Olympian Kelly Cheng playing with Kyra Zangle.
The top men’s seeds are Seain Cook and Logan Webber. Two indoor Olympians are the No. 2 seed, David Lee and Paul Lotman.
For more, click on this Volleyball Life link, or here at lagunaopen.org.
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