Preview: Men’s Volleyball Receives First UVC Tournament Bid Since 2018

ELMIRA, N.Y. – The Elmira College men’s volleyball team will compete in its first United Volleyball Conference Tournament since the 2018 season on Friday when they head to the campus of SUNY New Paltz to take on the No. 3 seeded and No. 9 nationally-ranked Brewers from Vassar College.

The tournament, which features six teams from the UVC, will begin Friday with a pair of quarterfinal round matchups before crowning a champion on Sunday who will receive an automatic berth to the NCAA Championships. In considerably the most competitive conference in Division III volleyball, all six teams to qualify for the UVC Tournament have either been ranked or received votes in the 2022 NVA/AVCA Division III national poll at some point this season.

Final 2022 United Volleyball Conference Championship Seeds

#1 – SUNY New Paltz (7-0)

#2 – St. John Fisher (5-2)

#3 – Vassar (5-2)

#4 – NYU (3-4)

#5 – Nazareth (3-4)

#6 – Elmira (3-4)

 

The Soaring Eagles enter the tournament with a 17-12 overall record and finished 3-4 in league play. Elmira played in three of the six UVC regular-season matches that went to five sets this season. Edwin Sosa ’25 is fourth among all UVC players with a .376 hitting percentage, while Ryan Mattes ’23 is eight with 0.69 blocks per set.

 

Alberto Mauricio ’25 leads the Soaring Eagles with 257 kills, 138 digs, and 38 service aces, while Oscar Munoz Trinidad ’23 is right behind with 233. Neiram Galan-Canales ’23 has a team-best 550 assists, while Jordan Peiser ’24 has added 201 kills.

 

It has been a year of firsts for the Soaring Eagles, as Munoz Trinidad set the program record earlier in the season, recording a .905 hitting percentage against Hilbert on February 12, recording 19 kills on 21 attempts. Additionally, the Soaring Eagles began the season by tying the best record to open a year (6-1) in program history with a 3-0 win over Division II Independent D’Youville. Its 17-12 record during the 2022 campaign is the best since they last qualified for the UVC Tournament in 2018, a season which saw EC go 20-12 with a 5-4 UVC mark.

 

Munoz Trinidad was honored on March 22 as the first AVCA Player of the Week from Elmira since assistant coach Ryan McDonough ’19 did so during the 2019 season, making Munoz Trinidad the 5^th player in program history to receive the…