NCAA Ladies
November 29, 2023
The NCAA Divsion I ladies’s volleyball event begins Thursday with 16 matches, together with all 4 of the regional No. 2 seeds — Kentucky, Oregon, Texas and Louisville — and No. 1 Wisconsin.
The opposite No. 1 seeds — Nebraska, Stanford and Pittsburgh – – open play Friday.
Since there are 32 first-round matches, Friday might be loaded, with not solely the 16 first-round matches, however eight between the Thursday winners.
Each first-round match may be seen on ESPN+. The matches at Texas will even be proven — if you happen to get it — on the Longhorn Community for the final time, as a result of that entitiy goes away after this faculty 12 months when Texas joins the SEC.
We”ll have a match-by-match first-round breakdown later Wednesday.
Convention award winners
The ACC, Huge 12, Pac-12 and SEC introduced their respective high gamers and coaches for the 12 months. The Huge Ten unveils its award winners Thursday,
ACC: There are co-players of the 12 months in Louisville senior exterior and Florida State junior exterior Audrey Koenig. The defensive participant of the 12 months is Louisville junior libero Elena Scott, the setter is Pittsburgh junior Rachel Fairbanks, and the highest freshman is Pitt proper facet Olivia Babcock. The coach of the 12 months is Florida State’s Chris Poole.
Click on right here for the full ACC honors checklist.
BIG 12: The participant of the 12 months is Texas junior exterior Madisen Skinner. The setter is Kansas junior Camryn Turner, the libero is Houston senior Kate Georgiades and the freshman is Iowa State exterior/proper facet Nayeli Gonzales. The coach of the 12 months is Ray Bechard of Kansas.
Click on right here for the full Huge 12 honors checklist.
PAC-12: Kendall Kipp, Stanford’s fifth-year proper facet, is the participant of the 12 months. The setter is Stanford junior Kami Miner, the libero Stanford senior Elena Oglivie and the freshman is Cal exterior Maggie Lie. The coach of the 12 months is JJ Van Niel of Arizona State.
Click on right here for the full Pac-12 honors checklist.
SEC: There have been, extremely, 4 coaches of the 12 months, Jason Watson of Arkansas, Craig Skinner of Kentucky, Daybreak Sullivan of Missouri and Eve Rackham Watt of Tennessee. Georgia senior center Sophie Fisher is the participant of the 12 months, Missouri sophomore Maya Sands is the libero and Kentucky exterior Brookyn DeLeye was the highest freshman.
Click on right here for the full SEC checklist that, whereas honoring 4 coaches, doesn’t embody a setter of the 12 months.
EHMAN’S B1G PICKS: Huge Ten Community analyst Emily Ehman, she of Jonas Brothers fame who joins us for our NCAA Zooms, tasks that Wisconsin’s Sarah Franklin is the POY, Nebraska libero Lexi Rodriguez is the defensive honoree, Nebraska’s Bergen Reilly is the highest setter and freshman, and Nebraska’s John Prepare dinner is the coach of 12 months. Observe her on Twitter @emilyehman
First-year coaches
The aforementioned Daybreak Sullivan of Missouri and Arizona State’s JJ Van Niel are amongst of a handful of first-year coaches whose groups are within the 64-team NCAA subject.
Earlier this week we featured Fairfield and first-year coach Nancy Somera.
NEC-champion LIU is the one crew within the bracket with a shedding file and the Sharks have a first-year coach in Amable Martinez.
Coastal Carolina coach Jozef Foreman left just a few video games into the season and Steve Loeswick took over on an interim foundation. Loeswick was named Solar Belt coach of the 12 months and his Chanticleers received the SBC event and the NCAA bid,
Keegan Prepare dinner is in his first 12 months at Minnesota and so is Matt Jones at UC Santa Barbara, promoted when Nicole Lantagne Welch retired after final season.
Liesa Rosen is the first-year coach at Fresno State, the shock winner from the Mountain West, and Jamie Morrison received the SEC’s Texas A&M again into the event in his first 12 months.
Ramblings
A bit of this and that: The Kansas Metropolis Roos didn’t make the event after shedding within the Summit closing to Omaha, however there’s a Roos within the subject. That’s as a result of the coach on the SoCon’s Wofford, making its first NCAA look, is ninth-year head coach Lynze Roos …
The one participant within the high 5 nationally in kills per set within the event is Skylar Fields of USC (5.19/set), who was second to Evansville’s Giula Cardona (5.34). Cardona led in whole kills (593), adopted by Tulsa’s Kayley Cassaday (592), Fields (586), Ohio State’s Emily Londot (546) and Raina Terry of Illinois (539) … The highest three blocks leaders — UIC’s Zahria Woodard (177), Drake’s Kacie Rewerts (171) and Northwestern State’s Reaghan Thompson (164) — should not within the event. Sophie Thompons of Colgate (163) is the one one within the high six within the subject. Subsequent are Wisconsin’s Carter Sales space and Purdue’s Raven Colvin tied for seventh at 157 …
Penn State, which performs Yale, is the one faculty to compete in each NCAA Division I Event because it began in 1981. Yale is coached by Erin Applebman, who was an assistant at Penn State for eight years, throughout which period the Nittany Lions received the 1999 NCAA title. We featured Yale earlier this month …
We have now two highschool teammates from right here in Baton Rouge within the event. Amber Igiede is the star center for Hawai’i. The Huge West Championship MVP performed membership for Purple Storm. Southeastern Louisiana, a crew that boasts 14 Louisiana gamers on its roster, contains sophomore DS Lexi Gonzales, who performed a lot of her profession for my membership, Volleyball Baton Rouge, earlier than I retired VBR in 2019. Each Igiede and Gonzales performed for Rob Smith at St. Michael HS. And the way about this: They’re each at Oregon, the place Southeastern Louisiana performs the Geese on Thursday and Hawai’i performs Iowa State. The winners play Friday …
ICYMI from our Sunday-night story, the groups with the longest successful streaks are Atlantic 10-champion Dayton (26), Convention USA-champion Western Kentucky (24), Missouri Valley-champion Northern Iowa (21), MAC-champion Western Michigan (20), Ivy League-champion Yale (17), SEC-champion Kentucky (16), American Athletic-champion SMU (15), and Huge East-champion Creighton (15) …
San Diego is the primary crew to make the NCAA nationwide semifinals one 12 months and fail to make the event the following since defending-champion Stanford in 2020/21. Price noting is that Stanford completed 2-8 within the COVID-marred spring of 2021. Earlier than that, one other crew coached by Kevin Hambly, Illinois, performed within the title match in 2011 however didn’t make the event in 2012. Earlier than that it was USC in 1986 …
The NCAA lastly up to date its RPI on its web site. Nebraska was No. 1, adopted by Stanford, Louisville, Pittsburgh, Wisconsin, Texas, Kentucky, Oregon, Creighton and Arkansas …
And just a little historical past: Texas swept Louisville for the 2022 nationwide title, its first since 2012. Within the semifinals, Texas San Diego, making its first nationwide semifinals look, and Louisville beat Pittsburgh in 5 as two ACC groups made their second and back-to-back final-four appearances.
Simply 12 packages have received because the NCAA started holding ladies’s volleyball championships in 1981: Stanford (9 instances), Penn State (7), Nebraska (5), UCLA (4), Hawai’i (3), Lengthy Seashore State (3), USC (3), Texas (3), Pacific (2), Kentucky (1), Wisconsin (1) and Washington (1).
Kentucky of the SEC was the one crew exterior of the Huge Ten or Pac-12 to win the crown since Texas of the Huge 12 received in 2012 when it received within the spring of 2021.
Wisconsin-Nebraska TV scores
From our Larry Hamel, who covers the TV facet of volleyball:
The NCAA volleyball match on Black Friday aired on Huge Ten Community recorded a total-average viewership of 507,000 and a ranking of .14 within the 18-49 demographic.
That’s down from the 587,000 that watched the Badgers and Huskers on Black Friday in 2022. The viewership is also lower than the 612,000 that tuned in on BTN for the primary assembly between the Huge Ten powers in October.
Nonetheless, a viewership of 500,000 is noteworthy. Final 12 months’s Black Friday match had a soccer sport main into it and this 12 months the Iowa-Nebraska tussle was telecast on over-the-air Fox. BTN used a replay of the primary assembly between Wisconsin and Nebraska in Lincoln as a lead-in. Nonetheless, Nebraska-Wisconsin ranked No. 13 on the day on cable within the 18-49 demo, based on the chart on the SpoilerTV website. It was the one BTN program within the high 150.
The scores for the NCAA bracket-announcement present that aired Sunday on ESPN ought to come out on Wednesday. That needs to be a quantity to notice, because the choice present was on flagship ESPN for the primary time.
NIVC begins Wednesday
The 32-team event begins with Southern Illinois of the Missouri Valley Convention taking part in DePaul of the Huge East and impartial Chicago State going through the Valley’s Drake. Each these matches are at Drake in Des Moines, Iowa.
Play continues with eight extra matches Thursday. Click on right here for the NIVC Event Central web site with the schedule and extra.
AVCA POW
The AVCA nationwide participant of the week is Wisconsin’s Sarah Franklin. The senior exterior averaged 5 kills a set in sweeps of Nebraska and Iowa, which included getting 16 kills and 12 digs towards the beforehand unbeaten Huskers. She is the primary Wisconsin participant to win the distinction this season. For that matter, the AVCA has not had a faculty represented greater than as soon as because the first award was giving for the week ending August 27.
Click on right here for extra and for the checklist of earlier winners this season.
Faculty Switch Showcase
Our associates at MasterCoaches are conducting a recruiting occasion on Saturday, December 16, on the AVCA Conference/NCAA Championship in Tampa.
The showcase is open to uncommitted gamers who’ve formally entered the NCAA Switch Portal, junior-college transfers who’ve accomplished their two years of eligibility, and NAIA and worldwide athletes.
The occasion is being organized and managed by Mick Haley, Bob Bertucci, Invoice Walton, Fran Flory, and Cathy George. Haley is the previous national-championship-winning coach at Texas and USC and coached the 2000 USA Olympic crew. Bertucci and Walton are longtime former school coaches with in depth resumes and former LSU coach Flory and former Michigan State coach George are actually Professional Volleyball Federation coaches.