2022 NCAA volleyball tournament: Bracket, schedule for the DI women’s championship

The 2022 NCAA women’s volleyball championship begins with selections on Nov. 27 and continues through to the national championship game Dec. 17 in Omaha, Neb., at the CHI Health Center.

Wisconsin is the defending national championship after the Badgers took home their first-ever national title in program history.

Here is the schedule for the 2022 volleyball championship (subject to change):

• The 2022 DI women’s volleyball championship selection show will be at 7:30 p.m. ET on Sunday, Nov. 27 on ESPNU
• First- and second-round games are Dec. 1-2 or 2-3.
• Regional games are Dec. 8 and 10.
• The national semifinals are Dec. 15
• The national championship match is Dec. 17.

The tournament will consist of four regions of 16 teams each. Regional play will be hosted by the top 16 national seeds in the tournament. There are 32 automatic qualifiers and the rest are at-large bids.

There is a new seeding criteria this season. Here’s the statement from the selection committee:

“The committee expressed an interest to seed the top 32 or 50% of the field (versus 25%) in order to generate a bracket with better competitive parity and avoid imbalance with respect to the relative strength of regional assignments. The committee recognizes that seeding 50% of the field would likely create additional travel expense in the bracketing process and would be a consideration for all team sports.”

So now instead of seeding just the top 16 teams, the committee will seed the top 32 teams on a national basis, across eight seed lines. The top 16 seeds will still host a regional and the top four will still host a super if given the opportunity. Seeds one-four will be one seeds, five-eight will be two seeds, nine-12 will be three seeds, etc. Teams seeded No. 17-32 will be the five, six, seven and eight seeds.

To create more competitive parity, the eight seeds will need to travel to one of the four one seeds. Seven seeds will have to play at one of the two seeds, etc. The remaining 32 teams will be placed in the bracket following bracketing policies approved by the NCAA Division I Competition Oversight Committee. The 16 first-and second-round winners will feed into four regions. When pairing teams, the committee will avoid conference matchups in the first and…