Pitt, Nebraska, Penn State, Louisville get No. 1 NCAA volleyball tourney seeds

Later Sunday night, look for our Zoom with, among others, the chair of NCAA Division I committee, Danielle Josette of Marquette; Nebraska coach John Cook, whose Huskers played 17 of the 64 teams in the field; Stanford junior outside Elia Rubin, Pitt junior middle Bre Kelley; Penn State coach Katie Schumacher-Cawley; and Minnesota coach Keegan Cook, whose Gophers played 13 of the teams on the bracket.

Two teams each from the ACC and Big Ten grabbed the coveted top four spots in the 2024 NCAA Tournament bracket.

ACC co-champion Pittsburgh (No. 1 overall, 29-1) Big Ten co-champion Nebraska (29-2), Big Ten co-champion Penn State (29-2) and Louisville, second in the ACC (25-5), are the No. 1 seeds.

The No. 2 seeds went to Stanford (25-4), which tied Louisville for second in the ACC and is in the Louisville regional; SMU (24-7) which finished fourth in the ACC, two games behind Stanford and is in the Pitt regional; Big East-champion Creighton (29-2),  which has won 22 in a row and is in the Penn State regional; and Wisconsin (23-6), which finished third in the Big Ten and is in the Nebraska regional.

The tournament begins Thursday with first-round matches also on Friday. See the bracket here.

Every first-round match will be on ESPN+. ESPN will also continue its fantastic The Fifth Set wraparound show with Sam Gore as the full-time host. It will be on ESPN+ starting at 4 p.m. Eastern Thursday and switches to ESPNU at 7 p.m. Paul Sunderland and Jennifer Hoffman will join Gore and when the ref calls for a sub, Nicole Branagh and Anne Marie Anderson will take their spots.

Pittsburgh, which won the ACC, opens with Morehead State of the OVC. Morehead was the No. 4 seed in the Ohio Valley Conference Championship and lost the title match, but advanced because Lindenwood is ineligible to play in the tournament because it’s in transition from Division II. The Pitt-Morehead State winner plays the UTEP-Oklahoma winner.

Nebraska plays SWAC-champion Florida A&M with the winner getting the winner of Miami, an at-large from the ACC, and Summit at-large South Dakota State.

Penn State plays MEAC-champion Delaware State. The winner plays the winner of Ivy League-champion Yale and North Carolina, an at-large from the ACC.

Louisville, coming off back-to-back losses to Pitt and Stanford to end the regular season, plays NEC winner Chicago State and the winner faces the winner of Missouri Valley Conference-champion Northern Iowa, which has won 20 in a row, against Illinois, an at-large from the Big Ten.

Of the so-called on-the-bubble teams, Washington and Illinois from the Big Ten got in and so did Ole Miss of the SEC. Arizona of the Big 12.  Rice of the American Athletic and Wright State of the Horizon League did not.

According to the ESPN selection show, the last four in were NC State, South Dakota State, UTEP and Washington, and the last four out were Arizona, Pepperdine, Rice and San Diego.

Conference breakdown

The following leagues got more than one team in:

ACC (9): Pitt, Stanford, Louisville, SMU, North Carolina, Florida State, Georgia Tech, Miami, NC State

Big Ten (9): Nebraska, Penn State, Wisconsin, Purdue, Oregon, USC, Minnesota, Illinois, Washington

SEC (9): Kentucky, Texas, Florida, Missouri, Texas A&M, Oklahoma, Tennessee,  Ole Miss, South Carolina

Big 12 (6): Arizona State, Kansas, Utah, Baylor, TCU, BYU

Just four conferences outside the big four of the ACC, Big 12, Big Ten and SEC got more than one team in, and only one team each.

Atlantic 10: Loyola Chicago, Dayton

Big East: Creighton, Marquette

Conference USA: Western Kentucky, UTEP

Summit League: South Dakota, South Dakota State

Worth noting

— Streaking: Western Kentucky, which plays Minnesota in the Pitt regional, has won a nation-best 24 in a row.

— Lone Star State: There are eight teams from Texas on the bracket, three teams from Texas alone in Austin, including the Longhorns, who play Texas A&M-Corpus Christi with the winner getting the winner of UT Arlington, which has won 20 in a row, vs. the Big Ten’s USC. Other Texas teams in the field are SMU, Sun Belt-champion Texas State, SEC at-large Texas A&M, and Big 12 at-larges Baylor and TCU.

— 2022 USA Volleyball U21: Every single player on that team that won the Pan Am Cup, coached by Pitt’s Dan Fisher, is in the tournament: Nebraska’s Lexi Rodriguez, Rebekah Allick and Merritt Beason; Purdue’s Chloe Chicoine and Raven Colvin; Pitt’s Rachel Fairbanks and Bre Kelley; Stanford’s Elia Rubin,;Minnesota’s Mckenna Wucherer; Creighton’s Norah Sis; Florida’s Alexis Stucky; and Devin Kahahawai of Texas.

— Sisters: We may miss some at first glance, but Texas A&M-Corpus Christi includes freshman Virginia Van Der Werff. College of Charleston has one of her older sisters in junior Olivia Mae Van Der Werff, and Utah has fifth-year Amelia Van Der Werff. They all played at Lansing High School in Kansas. There will also be two Klikas in the NCAA Tournament, Pitt’s Emily and Wofford’s Laney; and two Reillys in Nebraska’s Bergen and Raegen of Illinois; two Shaffmastrers, Melani of Minnesota and Mabrey of North Carolina; two Petersons, Jadyn of Northern Iowa and Payton of Louisville; and two Starcks, both on Penn State, freshman Izzy and senior Anjelina.

History

Texas swept Nebraska in 2023, giving the Longhorns back-to-back titles. Texas defeated Wisconsin four in the semifinals. Pittsburgh got swept by Nebraska as the Panthers made their third national semifinal appearance in a row.

Just 12 programs have won since the NCAA began holding women’s volleyball championships in 1981: Stanford (9 times), Penn State (7), Nebraska (5), UCLA (4), Hawai’i (3), Long Beach State (3), USC (3), Texas (4), Pacific (2), Kentucky (1), Wisconsin (1) and Washington (1).

Kentucky of the SEC was the only team outside of the Big Ten or Pac-12 to win the crown since Texas of the Big 12 won in 2012 when the Wildcats won in the spring of 2021.

The NCAA committee

The 10-member committee.

The chair is Danielle Josette, the Executive Associate Director of Athletics Marquette University. Josetti, who graduated from Creighton and got a master’s at Marquette, was a junior-college softball standout.

The two East members are Christian Bray, Senior Women’s Administrator at Harvard, and Kathy Litzau, SWA/Senior Associate AD at Wisconsin.

The South reps are Joeleen Akin, SWA at Georgia Tech, and Natasha Oakes, the SWA/Deputy AD at West Virginia.

The Southeast members are Cari Rosiek, SWA Associate AD at Coastal Carolina, and Jennifer Saxon, SWA/Executive Associate AD at Mississippi.

The West members are Stacy Kosciak, SWA/Deputy AD at Bowling Green, and Laura Alexander, SWA/Senior Associate AD at San Jose State.

The two Midwest members are Josetti and Julie Manning, SWA/Deputy AD at Minnesota.

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