The NCAA men's volleyball tournament, officially titled the NCAA National Collegiate Men's Volleyball Championship, is an annual competition that determines the
National Collegiate Athletic Association
The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges ...
(NCAA) championship in American college men's
volleyball
Volleyball is a team sport in which two teams of six players are separated by a net. Each team tries to score points by grounding a ball on the other team's court under organized rules. It has been a part of the official program of the Summ ...
. It had been the only NCAA championship in the sport from 1970 until 2012, when the NCAA launched a
Division III championship.
Unlike most NCAA sports, men's volleyball uses a modified version of the
National Collegiate
The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges an ...
championship format, which means
Division I and
Division II teams compete against each other in the same tournament.
In the past, schools from the Pacific Coast region have dominated this sport, in particular
UCLA
The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California ...
with coach Al Scates leading the program to 19 NCAA titles (more than any other coach).
Competition structure
Before the 2011–12 school year (2012 championship), men's volleyball did not have an official divisional structure; even now, that structure is truncated. The National Collegiate Championship remains as the NCAA's top-level championship, but Division III members now have their own championship event.
With the introduction of an official Division III championship, schools in that division are no longer eligible for the National Collegiate Championship. The last exception was Rutgers–Newark, whose men's volleyball program had been a
grandfathered
A grandfather clause, also known as grandfather policy, grandfathering, or grandfathered in, is a provision in which an old rule continues to apply to some existing situations while a new rule will apply to all future cases. Those exempt from t ...
scholarship program, and could compete for the National Collegiate Championship through 2014. Rutgers–Newark completed a transition to Division III men's volleyball at the end of that season, and joined the D-III
Continental Volleyball Conference
The Continental Volleyball Conference is an intercollegiate men's volleyball conference associated with the NCAA's Division III.
History
On April 4, 2011 Gary Williams, Associate Athletic Director of Carthage College announced in Milwaukee the fo ...
effective with the 2015 season.
There are three general regions for men's volleyball: "West", "Midwest", and "East". As of the next NCAA men's volleyball season in 2023, five "major conferences", defined here as leagues that include full members of Division I, represent these regions. The three "traditional" major conferences are the
Mountain Pacific Sports Federation
The Mountain Pacific Sports Federation (MPSF) is a college athletic conference with members located mostly in the western United States, although it now has members as far east as Pennsylvania. The conference participates at the NCAA Division I ...
(MPSF),
Midwestern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association (MIVA), and
Eastern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association
The Eastern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association (EIVA) is a college athletic conference whose member schools compete in men's volleyball. Its member institutions are located in the Northeast United States.
The EIVA Tournament champion receives ...
(EIVA). In the 2018 season, the ranks of "major" conferences expanded to include the
Big West Conference
The Big West Conference (BWC) is an American collegiate athletic conference whose member institutions participate in the National Collegiate Athletic Association's Division I. The conference was originally formed on July 1, 1969, as the Pacific ...
, the first Division I all-sports conference ever to sponsor men's volleyball. The
Northeast Conference
The Northeast Conference (NEC) is a collegiate athletic conference whose schools are members of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). Teams in the NEC compete in Division I for all sports; football competes in the Division I Foo ...
(NEC) becomes the second D-I all-sports conference to sponsor men's volleyball in the 2023 season. As of the most recent NCAA men's volleyball season in 2022, two Division II conferences sponsor men's volleyball at the National Collegiate level.
Conference Carolinas
Conference Carolinas, formerly known as the Carolinas-Virginia Athletic Conference (CVAC) or the Carolinas Conference, is a college athletic conference affiliated with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) primarily at the Divisio ...
(CC) was the first NCAA conference ever to sponsor men's volleyball as a scholarship sport, having launched its men's volleyball league in the 2012 season. The 2021 season was to have been the first for the
Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference
The Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SIAC) is a college athletic conference affiliated with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) at the Division II level. Formed in 1913, it consists mostly of historically black c ...
(SIAC), with six men's volleyball members, but the conference chose not to compete in that season due to
COVID-19
Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was COVID-19 pandemic in Hubei, identified in Wuhan, China, in December ...
issues. CC has had an automatic berth in the National Collegiate championship since the 2014 season, and the Big West received an automatic berth upon the creation of its men's volleyball league. The SIAC will not be eligible for an automatic berth until the 2024 season, and the NEC until 2025 (assuming that at least six inaugural men's volleyball members of each league continue to play in their respective conferences). Members of the
National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics
The National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) established in 1940, is a college athletics association for colleges and universities in North America. Most colleges and universities in the NAIA offer athletic scholarships to its st ...
(NAIA), a separate athletics governing body whose members are primarily smaller institutions, regularly play matches against NCAA teams.
Because of the historic lack of an official divisional structure in men's volleyball, four of the five major conferences have members that normally compete in Division II. Before the creation of the Division III national championship, the EIVA had several Division III members, but all of those schools now compete in D-III men's volleyball. The Big West became the first men's volleyball conference to consist entirely of D-I members in the 2021 season; this immediately followed UC San Diego, previously a Big West affiliate in men's volleyball (as well as women's water polo), starting its transition to Division I and fully joining the Big West. The NEC initially announced that it would launch its men's volleyball league in the 2023 season with five full D-I members and transitional D-I member Merrimack, but later announced that it would add Daemen and D'Youville, D-II members that had previously played as National Collegiate independents, as associate members effective with its first season in 2023.
Through the 2013 tournament, each of the three major conferences of that day (MPSF, MIVA and EIVA) received an automatic bid to the Final Four, with one additional at-large bid. The remaining bid was an at-large bid that could be awarded to any team in Division I or II (including Rutgers–Newark). Generally, the best team not receiving an automatic bid (usually from one of the three major conferences) received the at-large bid.
Beginning with the 2014 championship, the field expanded to six teams, with the two new teams being the champion of Conference Carolinas and one extra at-large entry. The new format featured two quarterfinal matches involving the four lowest-seeded teams in the field, with the winners joining the two top seeds in the semifinals. Originally, the quarterfinals were to be played at campus sites, with the Final Four at a separate predetermined site, but it was decided instead to have the entire championship tournament at one site.
With the Big West Conference adding men's volleyball for the 2018 season and qualifying for an automatic tournament berth, the championship now involves seven teams. The bottom two tournament seeds contest a "play-in" match; from that point, the tournament format is identical to the one used from 2014 to 2017.
Division I participation
The 2023 men's volleyball season features 29 Division I schools, up from 26 in 2022, which had been the sport's highest D-I participation level since 1985. All three of the newest D-I programs are transitioning from D-II to D-I. Merrimack added a new team, and Lindenwood and Queens (NC), which already sponsored the sport, started transitions from D-II to D-I in July 2022. From 1986 to 2021, the number of Division I schools sponsoring men's volleyball fluctuated between 20 and 24 teams. No traditional D-I conferences sponsored men's volleyball until the Big West Conference added the sport for the 2018 season. The Big West became the first NCAA men's volleyball league to consist entirely of D-I members when UC San Diego, which was one of the six charter members of Big West men's volleyball, began a transition to D-I upon joining the Big West full-time in July 2020. Of the other four major conferences, the only all-sports league is the Northeast Conference (NEC), which starts men's volleyball play in the 2023 season with six full conference members and two D-II members as single-sport associates. The Eastern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association (EIVA) and Midwestern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association (MIVA) are volleyball-specific conferences, while the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation (MPSF) is a multi-sport conference of schools whose primary conferences do not sponsor its ten sports. In addition to the 29 D-I schools, 31 Division II schools are expected to compete in D-I volleyball during the 2023 season:
* Charleston (WV) competes in the EIVA.
* Lewis, McKendree, and Quincy compete in the MIVA.
* Concordia–Irvine has been an MPSF men's volleyball member since the 2018 season.
* Daemen and D'Youville, which had previously competed as men's volleyball independents, became single-sport NEC members for the conference's first men's volleyball season in 2023.
*
Conference Carolinas
Conference Carolinas, formerly known as the Carolinas-Virginia Athletic Conference (CVAC) or the Carolinas Conference, is a college athletic conference affiliated with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) primarily at the Divisio ...
, the first all-sports conference in either Division I or II to sponsor men's volleyball, currently has 8 competing teams.
* The
Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference
The Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SIAC) is a college athletic conference affiliated with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) at the Division II level. Formed in 1913, it consists mostly of historically black c ...
was to start men's volleyball competition in 2021 with 6 newly launched teams, making those schools the first
historically black institutions to sponsor varsity men's volleyball. The SIAC chose not to compete in 2021 due to
COVID-19
Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was COVID-19 pandemic in Hubei, identified in Wuhan, China, in December ...
concerns, delaying the launch of men's volleyball to the 2022 season. During the 2021–22 offseason, the SIAC men's volleyball roster lost one of its intended 6 members when Paine left the NCAA, but kept its membership at 6 with the addition of men's volleyball by incoming SIAC member Edward Waters.
* Eleven D-II schools compete as men's volleyball independents. Three of these are campuses of the University of Puerto Rico. Of the remaining independents, only Coker and Limestone had sponsored the sport before the 2016 season. The others are Alderson Broaddus (2016), Lincoln Memorial (2017), Tusculum (2020), American International, Maryville (MO) (both 2022), and Missouri S&T (2023).
Two schools, one each in Division I and Division II, launched National Collegiate men's volleyball programs for the 2023 season.
* Transitional D-I member Merrimack is one of eight inaugural members of the NEC men's volleyball league.
* Missouri S&T, a full member of the D-II
Great Lakes Valley Conference
The Great Lakes Valley Conference (GLVC) is a college athletic conference affiliated with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) at the Division II level. Its thirteen member institutions are located in the U.S. states of Illinois ...
, is competing as an independent for the time being. In the 2021–22 school year, the GLVC had five men's volleyball schools; the launch of the S&T program maintained the conference's level of men's volleyball sponsorship after Lindenwood's July 2022 departure for the
Ohio Valley Conference
The Ohio Valley Conference (OVC) is a collegiate athletic conference which operates in the Midwestern and Southeastern United States. It participates in Division I of the NCAA; the conference's football programs compete in the Football Cham ...
(which sponsors volleyball only for women).
Five additional schools, all either current Division II members or transitioning to D-II, will add National Collegiate programs in the near future:
* Full D-II members Roberts Wesleyan and St. Thomas Aquinas will add programs in the 2024 season.
* Thomas More, an NAIA men's volleyball school which started a transition to D-II in 2022–23, will fully align with the NCAA for the 2024 season.
* Full D-II member Rockhurst will add men's volleyball in the 2025 season.
* Menlo, also an NAIA men's volleyball school, is planing to start a transition from the NAIA to D-II in 2023–24 and fully align with the NCAA for the 2025 season.
Division II does not have a separate national championship, and neither Division I nor II has a sufficient number of teams to sponsor a national championship without the other.
Champions
†Vacated due to NCAA violations
Team titles
All-time record
Source:
''as of end of
2022 tournament''
* indicates schools belong to Division II, indicates schools belong to Division III. (Men's championship is for both Division I and II.)
* indicates a school that no longer exists, but whose athletic program still exists.
* indicates a school that no longer sponsors men's volleyball.
*School indicates they have won at least one championship.
*Other bold indicates most in respective column.
Result by school and by year
30 teams have appeared in the NCAA tournament in at least one year starting with 1970, when the tournament shifted to its current bracket format. The results for all years are shown in this table below.
The code in each cell represents how far the team made it in the respective tournament:
* National Champion
* National Runner-up
* Semifinals (1970-2018, 2022-; 3rd place represents , 1970-1995)
:: Final Four (2019, 2021)
* Quarterfinals (2014-2016, 2018, 2019, 2021)
* First round (2018, 2019, 2021)
:: Opening round (2017, 2022-; second opening round represents 2022-)
Past tournaments
Historically,
California
California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...
-based universities have dominated the men's volleyball national championship;
Loyola Chicago,
Penn State, Ohio State,
BYU
Brigham Young University (BYU, sometimes referred to colloquially as The Y) is a private research university in Provo, Utah. It was founded in 1875 by religious leader Brigham Young and is sponsored by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day S ...
, and Hawaii are the only non-California universities to have won the National Collegiate championship;
Lewis
Lewis may refer to:
Names
* Lewis (given name), including a list of people with the given name
* Lewis (surname), including a list of people with the surname
Music
* Lewis (musician), Canadian singer
* "Lewis (Mistreated)", a song by Radiohead ...
also won the championship tournament, but had their victory vacated due to NCAA rules violations. Only seven non-California universities have participated in the National Collegiate championship match (Loyola, BYU, Penn State, Ohio State,
IPFW, Hawaii, and
Lewis
Lewis may refer to:
Names
* Lewis (given name), including a list of people with the given name
* Lewis (surname), including a list of people with the surname
Music
* Lewis (musician), Canadian singer
* "Lewis (Mistreated)", a song by Radiohead ...
), although other universities such as
Princeton
Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ni ...
and
Ball State have participated in the final four. Only five finals have involved two non-California schools: the 2003 final, when Lewis defeated BYU but had its win vacated; the 2015 final, in which Loyola defeated Lewis; the 2016 and 2017 finals, when Ohio State defeated BYU; and the 2021 final, when Hawaii defeated BYU.
Hawaii, UCLA, Southern California, Penn State, Stanford, and Long Beach State are the only schools in Division I to have won an NCAA national championship in both men and women's volleyball. In addition, Stanford (1996–97) and Penn State (2007–08) are the only universities whose men and women's volleyball programs won the national championship in the same academic year. The 2016 championship tournament took place from May 3–7 at
Rec Hall
Recreation Building, or Rec Hall as it is more commonly known, is a field house located on the University Park campus of the Pennsylvania State University. It was opened on January 15, 1929, and is still in use. Previously, Penn State's indoor ...
on the campus of
Penn State.
2011
* May 5, 2011 –
UC Santa Barbara
The University of California, Santa Barbara (UC Santa Barbara or UCSB) is a public land-grant research university in Santa Barbara, California with 23,196 undergraduates and 2,983 graduate students enrolled in 2021–2022. It is part of the U ...
def. Southern California, 29–27, 24–26, 25–15, 25–18; Ohio State def. Penn St., 25–18, 24–26, 25–22, 25-23
* May 7, 2011 – Ohio State def. UC Santa Barbara, 20–25, 25–20, 25–19, 22–25, 15-9
2012
* April 29, 2012 – Selections
* May 3, 2012 – Semifinals (6 p.m./8 p.m. PT) at
Galen Center
The Galen Center is a multipurpose indoor arena and athletic facility owned and operated by the University of Southern California. Located at the southeast corner of Jefferson Boulevard and Figueroa Street in the Exposition Park area of Los An ...
, Los Angeles, California: #1 seed UC Irvine defeated #4 seed Penn State 3-1 (18-25, 25–18, 25–15, 25–19); #2 seed Southern California defeated #3 seed Lewis 3-1 (25-18, 25–12, 18–25, 27–25)
* May 5, 2012 – Championship (7 p.m. PT) at Galen Center, Los Angeles, California: UC Irvine defeated Southern California 3-0 (25-22, 34–32, 26–24); 9,612 attended (record)
2013
* April 28, 2013 – Selections
* May 2, 2013 – Semifinals (6 p.m./8 p.m. PT) at
Pauley Pavilion
Edwin W. Pauley Pavilion, commonly known as Pauley Pavilion, is an indoor arena located in the Westwood Village district of Los Angeles, California, on the campus of UCLA. It is home to the UCLA Bruins men's and women's basketball teams. The ...
, Los Angeles, NCAA.com: No. 2-seed UC Irvine defeated No. 3-seed Loyola-Chicago 3–0; No. 1-seed BYU defeated No. 4-seed Penn State 3–0
* May 4, 2013 – National Championship (6 p.m. PT) at Pauley Pavilion, Los Angeles, ESPNU: UC Irvine defeated BYU 3-0 ( 25–23, 25–22, 26–24)
* May 4, 2013 – Game Notes: UC Irvine head coach David Kniffin became just the second coach in NCAA men's volleyball history to win a national title in his first season; 6,295 attended the title game
* May 4, 2013 – All-Tournament Team: Connor Hughes, who had 11 kills in the title game for UC Irvine (Most Outstanding Player); Chris Austin, UC Irvine; Michael Brinkley, UC Irvine Collin Mehring, UC Irvine; Kevin Tillie, UC Irvine; Ben Patch, BYU; Taylor Sander, BYU
2014
*The semifinals and finals 2014 tournament were held in the
Gentile Arena in
Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
, image_map =
, map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago
, coordinates =
, coordinates_footnotes =
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name ...
on the campus of
Loyola University Chicago. Two quarterfinal "play-in" matches were held at the Gentile Arena two days prior to the national semifinals, as the 2014 tournament expanded to six teams for the first time ever. A second at-large was added to the field, and the champions of the newly eligible
Conference Carolinas
Conference Carolinas, formerly known as the Carolinas-Virginia Athletic Conference (CVAC) or the Carolinas Conference, is a college athletic conference affiliated with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) primarily at the Divisio ...
men's volleyball division got an automatic qualification. The six teams were seeded according to the same methods used to seed the teams in previous tournaments, with the top two seeds receiving byes into the Final Four, and the third seed facing the sixth seed and the fourth seed facing the fifth seed in the quarterfinals.
*Apr. 29: Quarterfinals (#3 vs. #6 seed; #4 vs. #5 seed)
*May 1: Semifinals (#1 vs. #4-#5 winner; #2 vs. #3-#6 winner)
*May 3: NCAA Championship
2015
*The semifinals and finals of the 2015 tournament were held in the
Maples Pavilion
Maples Pavilion is a 7,392-seat multi-purpose arena on the campus of Stanford University in Stanford, California. Opened in 1969, Maples underwent a United States dollar, $30 million renovation in March 2004 and reopened ahead of schedule, in tim ...
on the campus of
Stanford University
Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...
. Two quarterfinal "play-in" matches were held at the Maples Pavilion two days prior to the national semifinals. The six teams were seeded according to the same methods used to seed the four teams in previous tournaments; the top two seeds received byes into the Final Four, while the third seed faced the sixth seed and the fourth seed faced the fifth seed in the quarterfinals.
*May 5: Quarterfinals (#3 vs. #6 seed; #4 vs. #5 seed)
*May 7: Semifinals (#1 vs. #4-#5 winner; #2 vs. #3-#6 winner)
*May 9: NCAA Championship
2016
2017
2018
2019
2021
2022
Broadcasters
* Expected announcer, subject to change.
See also
*
NCAA Division III men's volleyball tournament
*
NAIA Men's Volleyball Championship
The NAIA Men's Volleyball Championship is an annual tournament hosted by the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics to determine the national champion of collegiate men's volleyball among its members in the United States.
The inaugural ...
*
NCAA Women's Volleyball Championship The NCAA Women's Volleyball Championship refers to one of three championships in women's indoor volleyball contested by the NCAA since 1981:
*NCAA Division I Women's Volleyball Championship
*NCAA Division II Women's Volleyball Championship
*NCAA D ...
*
List of NCAA men's volleyball programs
This is a list of Universities in the United States, colleges and universities with National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) – sanctioned men's volleyball, indoor volleyball teams that compete for either the NCAA men's volleyball tournamen ...
*
Pre-NCAA Intercollegiate Volleyball Champions
Notes
{{National Collegiate Athletic Association
USA
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...