What 2 Watch 4
The Big West continues to roll through non-conference play with half of the team yet to drop a match in No. 2 Long Beach State, No. 5 UC Irvine and No. 17 UC Santa Barbara.
UCI and UCSB face road tests this week with the Gauchos playing a pair at No. 14 Stanford. The Anteaters travel to Provo for two matches against No. 8 BYU, who recently took two from UC San Diego.
The Beach are at home with matches against Fort Valley State and LIU, and the two foes will also meet up with No. 16 CSUN while on a West Coast road swing. No. 11 UC San Diego is also at home, with one match on the books against No. 1 UCLA on Friday, airing on ESPN+.
Hawai’i, already at 7-1 on the season with an extra early week of competition completed, is idle this week before embarking on a stretch of seven mainland matches.
Four contests on this week’s schedule are set for broadcast on ESPN+. Check listings for additional match information.
Poll Position
The Big West sees three teams in the top five with No. 2 Long Beach State, followed by No. 3 Hawai’i and No 5 UC Irvine in the latest AVCA National Collegiate Men’s Volleyball Poll. UC San Diego edged down to 11th with CSUN in 16th and UC Santa Barbara holding firm at No. 17 in the voting.
We’re No. 1
Various teams and individuals are ranked in the top 10 nationally highlighted by multiple list leaders:
• Long Beach State leads the nation in team blocking with 3.406 per set.
• UC Santa Barbara aces out opponents 2.56 times per set to top the listings.
• Individually, Long Beach State’s Skyler Varga serves up 1.067 aces per set to lead national collegiate volleyball.
• Hawai’i setter Tread Rosenthal averages 10.34 assists per set, a career-high.
The Big West teams and players top the individual match high charts in eight categories.
Weekly Winners
The Big West weekly winners went to the UC Irvine pair of William D’Arcy (offensive) and Andrej Jokanovic (freshman) after the Anteaters downed then No. t-3 Pepperdine on the road, award-winning mainstay Tread Rosenthal of Hawai’i (setter) picked up a seventh career nod and Long Beach State’s Ben Braun (defensive) after the defending national champions got exceptional net play against ranked foes No. 20 George Mason and No. t-13 Ohio State on the road.
Last Week, Today
The Big West picked up 11 wins over the past week with five teams claiming at least one victory. Some highlights on courts around the country included:
No. 2 Long Beach State (3-0, 0-0 BW)
The Beach buzzed through ranked foes then-No. 20 George Mason and then-No. t-13 Ohio State over the weekend with Skyler Varga’s offense and Ben Braun’s blocking highlighting the three-match road trip. Varga averaged 2.89 kills per set on .412 hitting with an impressive eight service aces over 10 sets on the court. Playing in the two weekend matches, Big West Defensive Player of the Week Braun denied 13 attacks for 1.86 blocks per set to go along with 14 kills on .684 hitting (14-1-19). Redshirt freshman setter Jake Pazanti dished out 10.22 assists per set while piloting an offense that hit a combined .471.
No. 3 Hawai’i (7-1, 0-0 BW)
Hawai’i’s remained on O’ahu to start the season, picking up a pair of wins against both Rockhurst and Roberts Wesleyan with three sweeping efforts. Sophomore opposite Kainoa Wade started three of the team’s four matches, averaging 5.33 kills per set on .451 hitting to go along with 13 digs, five blocks and four service aces. In Wednesday’s nightcap against Roberts Wesleyan, Wade pounded 21 kills on .514 with five digs in the three-setter. Big West Setter of the Week Tread Rosenthal played in the two contests against Rockhurst, averaging 11.57 assists per set while directing the offense to a combined .439 hitting in the series.
No. 5 UC Irvine (5-0, 0-0 BW)
The Anteaters opened the home slate with a sweep over Princeton and hit the road to record a 3-1 upset victory over then-No. t-3 Pepperdine in Malibu. Big West Offensive Player of the Week William D’Arcy was the catalyst in crashing the Waves, contributing 19 kills on .630 hitting with five digs and three aces. Big West Freshman of the Week Andrej Jokanovic finished the week averaging 3.71 kills per set with a match-high nine against the Tigers and 17 at Pepperdine. After the victorious effort, UCI jumped two spots in the AVCA polling to No. 5, cracking the top 5 for the first time in 2026.
No. 11 UC San Diego (3-2, 0-0 BW)
The Tritons fell in a pair of tough matches at No. 8 BYU. Leo Pravednikov hit .300 over the weekend with 20 kills (2.86 per set) and added four blocks in the series finale on Saturday. Junior Cameron Wurl set up 58 scoring plays across seven sets of action in Provo.
No. 16 CSUN (4-1, 0-0 BW)
The Matadors finished with a split weekend at the Under Armour Challenge. After suffering the season’s first defeat at Lindenwood, CSUN rebounded with a 3-1 win at Purdue Fort Wayne with freshman Noah Douphner making a first collegiate start while putting down a match-high 17 kills on .314 hitting. Older brother and redshirt sophomore Owen Douphner finished the match with 45 assists, five blocks and three kills in the win.
No. 17 UC Santa Barbara (4-0, 0-0 BW)
With one match on the docket, UC Santa Barbara swept through The Master’s (NAIA) with George Bruening’s 16 kills leading the way. Cole Schobel directed the offense with 32 assists (10.67 per set).
Be There at the Bren
UC Irvine’s Bren Events Center is home of The Hawaiian Islands presents the 2026 Outrigger Big West Men’s Volleyball Championship on April 23-25. All six conference members will head to Irvine to vie for The Big West’s automatic berth into the first year of a 12-team national postseason bracket. UCI will be playing host for the second time, also serving as the championship site in 2023, when the Anteaters finished as runners-up. Hawai’i reigns as Big West defending champion and has earned four total postseason crowns (2025, ’23, ’22, ’19). Long Beach State has three Big West titles to their name (2024, ’18) with UC Santa Barbara finishing atop the 2021 bracket.
National Superiority
Taking home the first four national championships when The Big West began sponsoring men’s volleyball in 2018 and a fifth in 2025, the league is looking to continue its strength on the national stage in 2026. With the Beach and the ’Bows claiming back-to-back national collegiate titles around the pandemic-shortened 2024 season and LBSU reigning supreme in the latest edition, The Big West has enjoyed at least one national finalist in each of the last seven seasons. Always dominant in the sport, the league opens the season with all six teams ranked in the national listings with four squads in the Top 10.
Coaches’ Corner
The Big West coaching lineup is decorated by national champions as players and coaches, national coaches of the year, one newcomer and 855 career wins heading into the 2026 campaign. Long Beach State alumni and long-time assistant Nick MacRae took the reigns from Hall of Fame coach Alan Knipe in December ahead of the 2026 campaign. Uniquely, five of the league’s six head coaches have only been the leader of their current team, with UCSB's Rick McLaughlin the only coach to have two stops on the resume.
Preseason Prognostications
For the third straight season, defending national champion Long Beach State was voted atop the 2026 Big West Men’s Volleyball Preseason Coaches’ Poll. The Beach are coming off a Big West regular-season championship and a third national title since men’s volleyball became a conference-sponsored sport in 2018.
The Beach earned top billing with four first-place votes and 24 total points in the voting, edging out 2025 Big West champions and National Collegiate Championship semifinalists, Hawai’i. The Rainbow Warriors are just two points back with 22 total points and the remaining two first-place votes in the polling of the league’s six head coaches.
Long Beach State (IN 2025: 30-3, 8-2 BW) won their third national collegiate trophy in The Big West era in May, sweeping through defending champion UCLA to hoist the trophy. The win marked the Beach’s fourth overall title, also claiming distinction in 1991. Hall of Fame head coach Alan Knipe retired in December, handing the reigns over to LBSU alumnus Nick MacRae before the start of the 2026 campaign. Opening the year ranked third in the national polling, the Beach see two student-athletes on the Preseason Coaches’ Team: Skyler Varga and Alex Kandev.
Varga, a redshirt senior opposite hitter, is the lone senior on the preseason listings. The native of Muenster, Saskatchewan, and 2025 AVCA All-American averaged 2.73 kills per set while hitting an effective .368 last season to go along with 33 aces from the service line. Kandev, a sophomore outside hitter from Sofia, Bulgaria, led LBSU is points per set during the freshman campaign contributing an average of 3.87 for the national champions. Kandev put down 210 total kills in 65 sets on the court.
Defending Big West champions Hawai’i (IN 2025: 28-6, 7-3 BW) enter the season ranked second, both nationally and in the league polling. The Rainbow Warriors enjoy three players on the preseason team listings in junior setter Tread Rosenthal and sophomore scoring duo of Adrien Roure and Kristian Titriyski. All three student-athletes are coming off of All-American seasons with Rosenthal and Roure earning first-team acclaim with Titriyski on the second team.
Hailing from Austin, Texas, Rosenthal assisted on 10.50 plays per set to lead The Big West last year, good for fourth in national collegiate volleyball. Roure, a Lyon, France, native, hit .327 in 2025 with 3.10 kills and 3.65 points per set from the outside position. Titriyski closed a first year of collegiate volleyball as UH’s offensive leader with 4.24 kills and 5.05 points per set on .325 hitting to go along with 34 service aces for the national semifinalists. Titriyski marks a second native of Sofia, Bulgaria on the seven-member preseason team, joining LBSU’s Kandev.
UC Irvine (IN 2025: 21-7, 6-4 BW), hosts of The Hawaiian Islands presents the 2026 Outrigger Big West Men’s Volleyball Championship, occupy third in the polling with 17 total points. The Anteaters open the year ranked sixth in the AVCA preseason listings. UCI will have to replace the services of 2024 AVCA and Big West Player of the Year and 2025 AVCA Distinction of Excellence Award winner, Hilir Henno. The Anteaters will rely on a youthful squad with just one senior and four juniors on the 18-player roster.
A three-way tie for fourth between CSUN, UC San Diego and UC Santa Barbara rounds out the polling with the Matadors, Tritons and Gauchos knotted at nine points apiece. All three squads find themselves in the AVCA’s preseason poll with UC San Diego opening in 10th, followed closely behind by CSUN in 11th. UCSB opens in 17th nationally.
CSUN opposite hitter Jalen Phillips makes an appearance on the preseason team after 2025’s All-American season. The redshirt junior from Anaheim, Calif., paced the Matadors with 4.22 kills and 4.76 points per set, both figures second in The Big West and seventh in national collegiate volleyball, only trailing UCI’s Henno in the league statistics.
UCSB redshirt sophomore George Bruening rounds out the seven-player preseason team. The All-Big West honorable mention outside hitter from Newport Beach, Calif., posted 2.97 kills and 1.10 digs per set playing in 18 matches in 2025.
2025 in Review
Long Beach State held serve in the national postseason, upholding their No. 1 ranking for much of the season by claiming the crown at the 2025 National Collegiate Men’s Volleyball Championship in Columbus, Ohio. The Beach swept through back-to-back defending champion UCLA to hoist their fourth national title trophy.
The Beach were joined by Big West champion Hawai’i on the national stage, where the Rainbow Warriors advanced to the semifinal round as the No. 2 seed in the brackets.
Long Beach State freshman phenom Moni Nikolov was named AVCA National Player of the Year, giving The Big West five straight awards. Nikolov was also named National Newcomer of the Year.
UC Irvine senior Hilir Henno earned the AVCA’s Distinction of Excellence Award whose contribution to the sport extends beyond accolades, uniting generational athletic excellence with personal integrity, academic commitment, and a long-term impact.
All six league programs were ranked in every poll throughout the season and finished up in the AVCA listings as: No. 1 Long Beach State, No.3 Hawai’i, No. 5 UC Irvine, No. 9 CSUN, No. 10 UC San Diego and No. 17 UC Santa Barbara.
Including honorable mention selections, a total of 22 Big West men’s volleyball players earned recognition on the AVCA’s All-American listings. Six men representing four member-institutions were named to the first team.
A total of six men’s volleyball student-athletes representing four member-institutions were tapped for the CSC Academic All-District listings. |
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