International Volleyball

Volleyball Today: More NCAA conference play begins; TV ratings; AVCA top 25; stat leaders

Volleyball Today: More NCAA conference play begins; TV ratings; AVCA top 25; stat leaders

Drake’s Jada Wills leads the nation in digs per set/Drake photo

There are still non-conference matches on Tuesday’s NCAA Division I volleyball schedule, but there is conference-opening play in the ASUN, Big West, Mountain West and Southland. 

There are a total of 12 matches, including unbeaten San Jose State (8-0) vs. Fresno State in the Mountain West and UC Irvine vs. Cal State Fullerton in the Big West.

Things get hopping Wednesday with 20 matches, including Big Ten openers featuring VolleyballMag Super 16 Media Poll No. 3 Penn State at No. 10 Purdue and No. 7 Wisconsin at No. 16 Minnesota. 

The SEC’s got AVCA No. 20 Tennessee home for Alabama and Georgia at Arkansas; the ACC has Miami at Florida State and No. 1 Pittsburgh (9-0) facing 1-9 UMBC; and the Big 12 has five matches including VBM No. 14 Arizona State at TCU (the last team out of our top 16), No. 9 Kansas home for UCF, and unbeaten Arizona (11-0) at AVCA No. 19 Baylor.

684,000 watched volleyball on ABC

From our guy Larry Hamel:

The landmark first regular-season NCAA women’s volleyball match televised by over-the-air ABC on Sunday afternoon had a total-average viewership of 684,000, according to the Nielsen ratings. The number likely would have tracked a bit higher if the match between Nebraska and Louisville had been more competitive. The visiting Cornhuskers swept the Cardinals before a program-record crowd of 14,126 at the spacious KFC Yum! Center in downtown Louisville, Kentucky, the site of the 2024 NCAA semifinals and final in December.

The last roughly two hours of the ABC volleyball telecast competed with NFL games on CBS and Fox. The volleyball match led into a first-round WNBA playoff game between the Connecticut Sun and Caitlin Clark’s Indiana Fever that logged a total-average viewership of 1.84 million, according to Nielsen.

AVCA top 25

If you missed the first VolleyballMag Super 16 Media Poll of the season, click here.

Pitt remained No. 1 in the latest AVCA Division I Women’s Volleyball Poll, getting 60 of the 61 first-place votes. The other went to No. 2 Nebraska, up from fifth. Stanford dropped a spot to No. 3, Penn State and No. 4, and Louisivlle dropped a notch, respectively. 

Creighton jumped three spots to No. 6, Wisconsin stayed seventh and Texas stayed No. 8. Kansas is up a spot to ninth and Purdue fell four spots to No. 10. 

Arkansas, which was 25th, dropped out, and Miami is back in at No. 25. 

Click here for the complete AVCA top 25.

NCAA volleyball national stat…

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