Part three of our quick three-part series giving a little background on the three major conferences in NCAA men’s volleyball.
Last but not (exactly) least, the EIVA. They’re the only conference to be precisely the same in composition this year as last. They’re also the only conference without a D-II member; they in fact have a D-III member (as you’ll read). Time will tell if that school chooses to stay at this level of competition now that there’s an actual, NCAA-sanctioned D-III national championship.
The clear class of the league, and this year’s preseason #1, is Penn State. They’re the only team in the league to have ever won an NCAA championship. They are the 14-time defending conference champions, having run the table in the EIVA the last four years, accruing a 14-0 regular season mark before also winning the conference tournament last year. Towering middle Aaron Russell is a force to be reckoned with, notching a .423 attack percentage and a block per set last season (though the Nittany Lions actually aren’t a great blocking team, marginally the lesser of their collective opposition last year). While 2012 All-American Joe Sunder is gone now, redshirt sophomore Nick Goodell and senior Tom Comfort both were consistent and effective offensive options a year ago (albeit both in slightly limited playing time), so they’ll pick up the pace with little trouble. Two Lions return who played in every match last season, middle hitter Nick Turko (efficient but not prolific, at .339 but just 1.28 KPS) and libero Connor Curry (just me, or are there a lot of volleyball players named Connor?). Aaron’s older brother Peter Russell also plays on the team, chipping in 2 KPS playing in about two-thirds of the team’s action.
One-time darlings of the NCAA men’s basketball tournament George Mason are picked second in the preseason EIVA poll. They were third in the conference regular season last year, falling to Penn State in the EIVA tournament final. Their win/loss record a year ago wasn’t much to write home about, checking in at just 13-17. But with only one major player from that team not returning from last year to this, the Patriots look to have experience on their side. They were a light-hitting team, managing only a .204 hitting percentage a year ago. Their leading scorer, at 3.2 KPS, was Mark Jones, who will no doubt look to improve upon his meager personal attack efficiency of .185. Senior middle Piotr Dobrowski was the team’s most efficient hitter at .288, and not even 1 KPS. Dobrowski did, however, put up very good blocking numbers, averaging a block and a half per. 6’8″ sophomore Hunter Stevens was just under 1 BPS last year (119 total blocks, playing in all 120 of George Mason’s sets, the latter feat matched by Dobrowski). The Patriots ran with two setters last season, as Pete Cuppernull and Javier Perez both spent time at the helm. With both returning, they surely will again. The Patriots would seem to run some curious defensive schemes, as they have two players listed at libero, John Jepson and Dave Lucas. Both played frequently, 100 and 102 sets respectively, but the dig totals for both are downright bad for liberos, even for the men’s game, at 51 and 43 respectively for the season. The Patriots were out-dug by their opposition, but not by a tremendous amount. Undersized outside hitter Max McFarland had over 2 DPS to lead the team.
Next comes the Ivy League contingent of the EIVA, with Princeton occupying the third slot. Along with Mason, they got one first-place vote in the preseason poll. Finishing fourth in the EIVA regular season in 2012, they, like Mason, had their season ended by Penn State. 2012 EIVA Newcomer of the Year Cody Kessel leads the way for the Tigers, coming off a freshman campaign where he notched an even 4 KPS, playing in all 23 matches and 93 sets for Princeton and doing it on a respectable .263 attack percentage. Sophomore swingman Will Soroky took more than a block per set a year ago, and racked up a .435 attack percentage to go with it. With Kessel adding .90 BPS and senior middle Michael Dye another .79, Princeton are a legitimately good blocking team. And I’d be remiss if I didn’t call attention to the luxuriant locks of second-string libero Bar Shabtai. He does stand out in this crowd with that hairstyle. And here’s how closed-minded I am sometimes, I never before really thought of Jews being present in China (Shabtai was born in Beijing), but what the hell, it’s a major world religion and the world’s most populous country. So of course it happens. Shabtai probably won’t get much playing time – sophomore Tony Ensbury has the libero position pretty well covered – but his background and hairdo stuck out at me.
And now the other half of the EIVA’s Ivy League contingent – Harvard. The Crimson are a strong hitting team, putting up a .298 team mark a season ago. Junior Nick Madden, listed as a middle in last season’s statistics but as an opposite on this year’s roster, is the top returning scorer, notching a tick better than 3 KPS a year ago. Freshman Caleb Zimmick put up some strong numbers a year ago playing in half the Crimson’s sets, getting 2 KPS and 1.2 BPS with a .409 attack percentage. Little doubt he’ll get more playing time this year to try to spread that out a little. Harvard and their opponents each had 102 service aces last year, an interesting little wash. Junior setter Rob Lothman returns to run the Crimson’s offense (the Crimson offense? Sounds like something we’d call in Sean Connery for).
The St. Francis Terriers, who by day are members of that volleyball bastion the Northeast Conference, are fifth in the rundown. Unsurprisingly, the lower we get, the fewer standout returners there are. Junior outside Logan Patterson is probably the best scorer the Terriers bring back from 2012. I say probably because while he did have a decent two-and-a-half KPS, he also had a ton of errors and managed just a .178 for the season. St. Francis also lose their primary setter from a year ago, so Mike Krepp will have to fill the role after having only sparing playing time last season. The Terriers do, however, bring back their two best blockers from last year’s squad, and blocking was the one area where they were solidly better than their opposition, nearly a block per set better. Adam Roche and Mark Kochan both saw consistent, albeit not constant, playing time in 2012 and were each better than a block per set (Roche better than a block and a half per set). They’re clearly the team’s biggest strength going forward.
Coming in at number six are the NJIT Highlanders. They’re Division I and they do have a primary conference, though I’d believe you if you said you were surprised by either of those things. They play in the the fledgling Great West Conference, a league formed some years ago as a football-only league – which now no longer sponsors football. They’re the only team in it (and it only has 5 full members) that aren’t leaving for a different conference as of the 2013-14 season, so it’s pretty likely to fold. NJIT a few years back made headlines for going through an entire men’s basketball season without a single victory, so theirs really isn’t the most happening athletic program around. Also, why is the New Jersey Institute of Technology in the Great West Conference anyway? You don’t hear about Boise State or San Diego State joining the Big Ea…….forget I brought it up.
But the Highlanders have played men’s volleyball since at least 2005 (that’s how far back their website goes with stats). Doug Battersby, a senior listed as a split between setter and right-side hitter (which happens sometimes) despite only 8 set assists last season, is surely their leader, having played in all 29 matches and all but 10 sets last season. The only player who played more is no longer with the team. It’s therefore kind of difficult to know who else to call out, since there really was no core group of players that got a full season’s worth of playing time (or nearly that). Regular libero Brady Smith played in 28 of the team’s matches, but also had one start (though they’re announced with the starting lineup, liberos aren’t considered to be part of it), so even he was moved around a bit. Just like all other positions, setter was a revolving door, with two players getting over 400 set assists and another over 200. Two of those three return, and there are again three setters on the roster, so they’ll probably do likewise again this year.
The Sacred Heart Pioneers are seventh. They actually do return their top scorer from 2012, fourth-year junior Nick Hunt, who checked in with 3.66 KPS last season. His hitting percentage was gruesome, though, at a mere .158. No member of the 2012 team hit above .300 last season (except for the .500 mark of a two “swing” “season” by secondary libero Connor Bohl), presenting a clear weakness for the team. Their primary setter from last year is gone as well, though he was listed as a freshman in 2012, meaning he must have transferred. Junior Jason Kinney, who’s listed as a setter, played every match and every set last season, and still only got 6 assists all year (how does that even work?) will have to assume the role.
Honestly, I’m not sure why the Rutgers-Newark Scarlet Raiders (not to be confused with the Division I Rutgers Scarlet Knights) persist in the EIVA. They’re a Division III school and the Northeast is exceptionally robust for D-III men’s volleyball (other than UC Santa Cruz, basically the entirety of the sport is in the Northeast). Maybe they have plans to leave, I don’t know. They won just two EIVA matches a year ago, tying with Sacred Heart for last place in the conference. A year ago, they were a statistically very strong serving team, but like I said before, that’s not actually something you want to be. The most striking thing about this team is its youth – 13 members, 11 freshmen, 2 sophomores. The only returners at all, forget about significant contributors, are Lorenzo Samin and Manuel Felipez, middle and outside respecitvely. Felipez did play every match and every set, but how on earth can you call upon a sophomore to be your ‘experienced’ team leader? This team is going to get massacred, there’s really no polite way to say it.
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