International Volleyball

Fort Valley in; 5 NCAA men’s volleyball bids up for grabs Saturday

Fort Valley in; 5 NCAA men's volleyball bids up for grabs Saturday

UCI’s Hilir Henno and Alaka’i Todd of Hawai’i joust/UCI photo

Fort Valley State is going to the NCAA’s National Collegiate Men’s Championship.

The Wildcats, who breezed through the SIAC with a 10-0 regular-season record, won that conference’s tournament Friday by sweeping Central State to claim the SIAC’s historical first automatic NCAA bid.

Five more automatic bids will be earned Saturday with tournament championships in the Big West, Conference Carolinas, EIVA, MIVA and MPSF.

The remaining two spots will be filled with at-large bids when the NCAA bracket is announced Sunday.

In the Pro Volleyball Federation on Friday, the Columbus Fury broke the first-place Atlanta Vibe’s six-match winning streak as Kendall Kipp had 25 kills, 11 digs, four blocks — three solo — and two aces. There is one PVF match Saturday when the San Diego Mojo play at the Omaha Supernovas.

Fort Valley State wins the SIAC

FVSU wins SIAC

Fort Valley State (17-8) thumped Central State (9-27) 25-21, 25-17, 25-15. 

Isaiah Fedd had 13 kills, an assist, an ace, a block and two digs. Chey Cooper added 10 kills, hit .368, and had two assists, three aces, a block and 13 digs. FVSU hit .253 and had nine aces and only four serving errors. 

This is the third year of the SIAC but the first year the league gets an NCAA bid.

Central State, which hit .127 and had two aces and six errors, got 17 of their 32 kills from Tyrone Sands. He had an ace, two blocks and 10 digs.

UCI’s Hilir Henno hits through the Hawai’i block/UCI photo

Big West: Long Beach vs. UCI

Top-seeded Long Beach State (24-2) plays second-seeded UC Irvine (19-9) at Hawai’i. 

The winner gets the Big West’s automatic bid, but the loser is almost assuredly going to be one of the two at-large recipients.

They split back-to-back matches just a week ago to end the regular season, with UCI sweeping at home on April 6 and then Long Beach doing the same a day later.

Friday, Long Beach State knocked out fifth-seeded CSUN 25-23, 22-25, 25-20, 25-22 as Clarke Godbold tied his season high with 18 kills. Godbold hit .368 and had an ace, a block and a dig. Sotiris Siapanis had 13 kills, hit .360, and had two assists, two aces, two blocks and six digs. Skyler Varga had 12 kills with two errors in 24 attacks to hit .417 and had two blocks and five digs. Simon Torwie had six kills, hit .364, and had seven blocks, two solo. Long Beach hit .358 and had three aces and 16 errors.

CSUN, which ended its season 13-16, hit .252 and had five aces…

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