Concordia-Irvine schedules home match vs. Penn State in 2023

Photo courtesy of Concordia-Irvine athletics

The Golden Eagles will get their shot at home against the likely preseason favorite to win the EIVA.

Concordia-Irvine as part of recently unveiling its 2023 schedule announced it will have a home non-conference match versus Penn State on March 4.

Penn State ended the 2022 regular season at No. 2 in the national media poll but missed the NCAA Tournament after being upset in the EIVA Tournament semifinals. The team also returns a majority of starters, including the 2021 EIVA Player of the Year setter Cole Bogner and the 2022 EIVA Player of the Year outside attacker Brett Wildman.

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Concordia-Irvine under new head coach Riley Salmon had a winning record midway through last season but ended the year on a seven-match losing streak. In addition, middle attacker Gil Herold led the MPSF and was in the nation’s top 15 with a 1.00 blocks per game average.

This will be the second time Penn State and Concordia-Irvine have played each other and the first time since the Golden Eagles transitioned to be an NCAA Division II program. Concordia-Irvine as an NAIA team suffered a four-game loss to Penn State in 2013.

The match versus the Nittany Lions will be the final of three non-conference matches for the Golden Eagles in 2023 against teams that ended last season in the top 10 of the national rankings.

Concordia-Irvine will travel to play the two-time defending NCAA champions Hawai’i on Feb 16. It also will play host to UC San Diego on Feb. 21 before starting MPSF play later that week at home against BYU.

2023 Concordia-Irvine regular season schedule

Jan. 11 vs. Vanguard
Jan. 13 vs. Edward Waters
Jan. 18 vs. Princeton
Jan. 19 vs. Menlo
Jan. 20 at UC Irvine
Jan. 21 vs. UC Irvine
Feb. 2 vs. Loyola
Feb. 9 vs. Benedictine Mesa
Feb. 10 vs. The Master’s
Feb. 16 at Hawai’i
Feb. 21 vs. UC San Diego
Feb. 24 vs. BYU
Feb. 25 vs. BYU
March 1 at UCLA
March 3 vs. UCLA
March 4 vs. Penn State
March 24 at Grand Canyon
March 25 at Grand Canyon
March 31 at Stanford
April 1 at Stanford
April 6 vs. Pepperdine
April 8 at Pepperdine
April 13 vs. USC
April 15 at USC