The NCAA Men’s Volleyball Playoffs officially started last weekend with a few upsets! We still find it hard to believe that a couple of our favorite top ranked teams are no longer in the Elite 8 like BYU and defending champs Stanford. Shocking!
The great news we’d like to share is that you can watch the MPSF semifinal matches online tonight. We’re not kidding! You can watch them for free!
Since we had the chance to watch a couple of quarterfinal matches over the weekend, below is our honest opinion on some of the MPSF teams. We repeat, below is just our opinion. We must also make it clear that these teams are not just amazing but also the home teams of some of the nation’s best players who will eventually represent Team USA. They fight and play hard to win.
MPSF aka Mountain Pacific Sports Federation.
USC is like the Brazilian NCAA team this season. Powerful and Disciplined. They just have so many weapons led by Murphy Troy and Tony Ciarelli. To win against UCLA was expected. We didn’t get to see this match but based on this report, USC pretty much dominated against the Bruins even if they lost a set.
We found this interesting article about the Trojans (Senior Players) and we suggest you read it to know more about the team.
#7 UC Santa Barbara played an almost perfect match to defeat #2 BYU in front of 2,375 Cougar fans. We were able to watch the match and we already knew from the early parts of Set 1 that the Gauchos would upset BYU – and we were right! UCSB remained focused and less erratic from start to finish. The Gauchos relied on the heavy arms of Menzel (27 kills) and Cullen Irons (13 kills) to lead their offense while the rest of the team remained disciplined and determined despite some taunting chants from the crowd.
On the other hand, BYU played okay but their go to hitters seemed to have lost connection with the setter. Rob Stowell was having a terrible night with his serves ( 6 errors) and also offensively (19 kills, 8 errors, 39 attempts). He would pound a ball every now and then but his efficiency was just very low. Just like last year against CSU Northridge, Stowell choked when needed. We also noticed he was less intense. Sadly, he was just having a rough night in the most important match of the season.
Freshman of the Year, Taylor Sander, played on and off as well. Don’t get us wrong, we love Taytay and his amazing volleyball skills but he just underperformed against UCSB. We expected him to step up since Stowell was having a forgettable match. Well, he’s got 3 more years to go.
Maybe it’s just us but one major major observation we have from the match was that BYU did not have a leader on the court compared to UCSB who had Menzel keeping the intensity on their side. He was celebrating like Giba with his teammates (sans the brotherly kiss of course which Giba does to his teammates).
Senior outside hitter, Kevin Sagers, should have stayed in the match instead of Alex Da Pron. We love Alex but he’s just too quiet on the court. He doesn’t excite us compared to Kev’s personality on the court. Kev is a LEADER. During crucial moments, someone has to lead the troop right?
We didn’t see the match but based on the Match Report, it was a highly contested battle but in the end #6 Long Beach State prevailed over the defending champs in 5 sets.
We’ve seen a few Stanford matches at Maples Pavilion this season and we think they really need new to work on their middle blockers/hitters. Their middles are good but they’re just too short compared to the middles of the other MPSF teams. The size of their middles is/was a liability against top ranked teams. We’re also not that impressed with Evan Barry‘s setting choices but we still admire his skills. Plus, Stanford is/was missing a real opposite hitter. We thought freshman Brian Cook was the perfect choice for that position but what in the world happened to him? Brad Lawson is Brad Lawson: strong and reliable. He’s Stanford’s #1 weapon followed by Spencer McLachlin. We’ll forever be a Stanford Fan.
Anyways, this match is over and done. UCSB will play against #5 LBSU in the semis while #1 USC will face #4 UC Irvine in the other semifinal match. The great news we’d like to share is that you can watch these matches online tonight. We’re not kidding! You can watch them for free!
Luckily, we found the full match on Youtube. We’re very proud of UCI’s victory. They are constantly improving and Carson Clark is becoming almost unstoppable to lead his team supported by his talented comrades like Yoder and DuFault.
The CHAMPION of the MPSF advances to Final Four while 1 Team Gets the NCAA BID to join the Finals to be hosted by Penn State University. The other 2 teams who will join the F4 will be the winner from each conference:
EIVA Tournament:
No. 1 seed Penn State vs. No. 4 seed Rutgers-Newark
No. 2 seed George Mason vs. No. 3 seed Springfield
MIVA Tournament
No. 1 seed Ohio State vs. No. 4 seed Lewis
No. 2 seed Loyola vs. No. 6 seed Quincy
G-luck BBs! May the best team wins!
(image:dailynexus.com)
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