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Check out the five things to take away from the NCAA Division I-II men’s volleyball matches this weekend.
UC Irvine loses but makes playoffs — No. 15 UC Irvine had to wait about two hours after its regular season-finale loss to No. 5/5 Long Beach State, but it eventually clinched the final berth to the MPSF Tournament. UC Irvine earned the No. 8 seed after No. 15 Cal Baptist lost a road match against No. 9/9 Hawai’i on Saturday to finish a match behind the Anteaters in the conference standings. With the Lancers loss, the Anteaters avoided becoming the first defending MPSF champion to not make the postseason since 2013.
BYU rolls through USC to get No. 1 seed — No. 1/1 BYU hit more than .400 and held USC to less than a .075 attack percentage in both matches of its weekend series sweep to clinch the MPSF regular season championship. The Cougars as the No. 1 seed will have home court advantage throughout the MPSF Tournament beginning with its quarterfinal match against UC Irvine on Saturday. This is the third time in last four years that BYU has won the conference regular season title.
Ohio State keeps on winning — Outside attacker Nicolas Szerszen had a match-high 16 kills and zero attack errors while hitting .593 as No. 2/3 Ohio State swept Lindenwood to clinch the outright MIVA regular season title on Friday. This is the first time since 2013 that the Buckeyes will enter the MIVA Tournament as the No. 1 seed. In addition, Ohio State swept Quincy on Sunday to end the regular season on a nation-best 17-match winning streak.
Stanford stumbles to No. 4 seed — There was a chance entering the final day of the regular season for No. 2/3 Stanford to win the MPSF regular season title, but instead the team ended the night as the No. 4 seed. Stanford on the road lost to No. 7/7 UC Santa Barbara in four games on Saturday and because of tiebreakers dropped in the conference seeding. Despite the loss, All-American setter James Shaw had 31 assists and seven kills before leaving the match after the third game.
Barton playing for conference title — Barton remained in Conference Carolinas regular season title contention following two wins this weekend and Erskine losing to Belmont Abbey in its regular-season finale. If Barton can defeat Pfeiffer in its regular-season finale on Tuesday, the Bulldogs will win the conference regular season title and earn the conference tournament’s No. 1 seed for the first time in their program history.