Two Big West women's volleyball squads earned bids to play in the 2021 postseason, announced Sunday evening by each respective tournament. Hawai'i is headed to the 2021 NCAA Division I Women's Volleyball Tournament, representing The Big West after earning the conference crown and receiving The Big West automatic bid into the field.
The Rainbow Wahine (21-7, 18-2 Big West) are making their 39th overall NCAA Tournament appearance, and 28th consecutive in which they had the opportunity to compete, dating back to 1993. Hawai'i, and the Big West, did not play in the fall of 2020, nor in the seasonally-altered spring 2021 season due to COVID-19.
Hawai'i will be serving up a first-round match against Mississippi State on Friday, Dec. 3 at 4:30 p.m. PT from American Airlines Arena in Seattle, Wash. The match winner will face off against the victor of the match between pod host and No. 15 seed Washington and Brown on Dec. 4 at 7 p.m. PT.
The Rainbow Wahine earned The Big West automatic bid into the field after earning its 10th overall title and sixth since rejoining the league in 2012. The regular-season champions led The Big West in blocks per set (2.58) and opponent hitting percentage (0.183), while combining their big play at the net with 14.14 kills per set, good for 13th in the nation.
Thirty-two conferences were awarded automatic qualification in the NCAA field, and the remaining 32 slots were filled with at-large selections by the Division I Women's Volleyball Committee to complete the bracket. The top 16 teams were seeded nationally and placed within four regions. Undefeated Louisville (28-0) earned the bracket's top seed, followed by No. 2 seed Texas, No. 3 Pittsburgh and No. 4 Wisconsin.
Also earning an invitation to compete in the postseason is CSU Bakersfield (18-9, 10-11 Big West). The Roadrunners accepted an at-large initiation to play in the National Invitational Volleyball Championship (NIVC), sponsored by the American Volleyball Coaches Association.
CSU Bakersfield travels to Ogden, Utah to take on host Weber State on Friday, Dec. 3 at 5 p.m. PT. The match winner will advance to face either Pacific or Portland State on Saturday at 1 p.m. PT in the second round of the 31-team single-elimination bracket.
Picked in the preseason coaches' poll to finish ninth in their first season of Big West membership, CSU Bakersfield instead landed in fourth in the final league standings and finished the regular season with the highest win percentage in the program's Division I history. This will be the third postseason appearance for the Roadrunners under the guidance of Director of Volleyball Giovana Melo (NCAA – 2014, '17), and their first in the rebooted NIVC, now in its fourth iteration.
The NIVC third round is slated for Dec. 6-8, with the tournament semifinals scheduled for Dec. 8-11 and the championship penned in for the window of Dec. 12-14.
After the first and second rounds, advancing squads in the 64-team NCAA bracket head to regional competition slated for Dec. 9 and 11 at four non-predetermined campus sites to be announced following the completion of the second round.
NCAA regional winners will advance to the national semifinals and championship final hosted by Ohio State University in conjunction with the Columbus Sports Commission Dec. 16-18 at Nationwide Arena in Columbus, Ohio.