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Two teams that reached the 2021 NCAA Tournament will meet in the first weeks of the upcoming season.
Pepperdine as part of releasing its 2022 regular season schedule announced it will have a non-conference home match against the defending MIVA champions Lewis on Jan. 28.
Both the Waves and Flyers ended last season in the top five of both the national coaches poll and national media poll.
Pepperdine finished in third place in the MPSF and advanced to the conference tournament finals as it earned the final at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament. In addition, the team in its second consecutive NCAA Tournament appearance lost to the Big West champions UC Santa Barbara in the opening round.
The Waves return the majority of their starters, including the 2021 National Newcomer of the Year setter Bryce Dvorak. It also added Stanford transfer and All-MPSF opposite Jaylen Jasper who returns to the court after being seventh in the nation with a 4.11 kills per game average in 2020.
Despite Lewis losing multiple starters to graduation, the team still features multiple All-Americans. Middle attacker Tyler Mitchem was the runner-up for the 2021 Ryan Millar Award as the nation’s top middle attacker, while setter Kevin Kauling was the runner-up for the 2021 Lloy Ball Award as the nation’s top setter.
Pepperdine leads the all-time series 3-2 and won the last meeting in 2019. This also will be the first home match for the Waves in the series since splitting a pair of matches in 2012.
The match versus Lewis will be part of a three-match stretch for Pepperdine against teams that made the NCAA Tournament.
Pepperdine will have a home-and-home series against UC Santa Barbara with the Waves’ home match on Jan. 21.
Along with these early season non-conference matches, the Waves will open the season with a four-match ConfCarolinas road trip. Pepperdine will start the season with a two-match series against the defending ConfCarolinas regular season champions Mount Olive and then will play a two-match series versus Barton.
2022 Pepperdine schedule
Jan. 5 at Mount Olive
Jan. 6 at Mount Olive
Jan. 7 at Mount Olive
Jan. 8 at Mount Olive
Jan. 14 vs Erskine
Jan. 17 vs. Princeton
Jan. 21 vs. UC Santa Barbara
Jan. 28 vs. Lewis
Feb. 4 at UC Santa Barbara
Feb. 9 vs. UC Irvine
Feb. 11 at UC Irvine
Feb. 18 at Grand Canyon
Feb. 20 at Grand Canyon
Feb. 23 vs.USC
Feb. 25 at USC
March 4 at McKendree
March 5 at McKendree
March 11 vs. George Mason
March 16 vs. CSUN
March 18 at CSUN
March 25 vs. BYU
March 26 vs. BYU
March 31 at Concordia-Irvine
April 2 vs. Concordia-Irvine
April7 vs. UCLA
April 9 at UCLA
April 14 vs. Stanford
April 16 vs. Stanford