The NCAA Men's National Collegiate Volleyball Championship was, before 2012, the only tournament that determined the NCAA championship of American college men's volleyball. It remains the NCAA's top-level men's volleyball championship, following the 2012 establishment of a Division III championship.
Schools from the Pacific Coast region have dominated this sport, in particular UCLA. Al Scates, the coach at UCLA, has won more NCAA titles (19) than any other coach. Pepperdine has the second most titles with five.
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Competition structure
Before the 2011-12 school year (2012 championship), men's volleyball did not have an official divisional structure; even now, that structure is truncated. The National Collegiate Championship remains as the NCAA's top-level championship, but Division III members now have their own championship, officially known as the NCAA Men's Division III Volleyball Championship.
With the introduction of an official Division III championship, schools in that division are no longer eligible for the National Collegiate Championship. The last exception was Rutgers-Newark, whose men's volleyball program had been a grandfathered scholarship program, and could compete for the National Collegiate Championship through 2014. Rutgers-Newark completed a transition to Division III men's volleyball at the end of that season, and joined the D-III Continental Volleyball Conference effective with the 2015 season.
There are three general regions for men's volleyball: "West", "Midwest", and "East". The three major conferences that currently represent these regions are the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation (MPSF), Midwestern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association (MIVA), and Eastern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association (EIVA). After the creation of the D-III national championship, the only other conference whose members are eligible to compete for the National Collegiate Championship is Conference Carolinas, a Division II league. Members of the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), a separate athletics governing body whose members are primarily smaller institutions, regularly play matches against NCAA teams.
Because of the historic lack of an official divisional structure in men's volleyball, all three major conferences have members that normally compete in Division II. Before the creation of the Division III national championship, the EIVA had several Division III members, but all of those schools now compete in D-III men's volleyball.
Through the 2013 tournament, each of the three major conferences (MPSF, MIVA and EIVA) received an automatic bid to the Final Four, with one additional at-large bid. The remaining bid was an at-large bid that could be awarded to any team in Division I or II (including Rutgers-Newark). Generally, the best team not receiving an automatic bid (usually from one of the three major conferences) received the at-large bid.
Beginning with the 2014 championship, the field expanded to six teams, with the two new teams being the champion of Conference Carolinas and one extra at-large entry. The new format features two quarterfinal matches involving the four lowest-seeded teams in the field, with the winners joining the two top seeds in the semifinals. Originally, the quarterfinals were to be played at campus sites, with the Final Four at a separate predetermined site, but it was decided instead to have the entire championship tournament at one site.
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Division I participation
The number of Division I schools sponsoring men's volleyball has fluctuated between 20 and 24 teams since 1986. None of the traditional D-I conferences sponsor volleyball. Two of the three major conferences, the Eastern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association (EIVA) and Midwestern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association (MIVA), are volleyball-specific conferences. The third major conference is the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation (MPSF), a multi-sport conference of schools whose primary conferences do not sponsor its ten sports. In addition to the 22 D-I schools, 24 Division II schools are competing in D-I volleyball in the current 2017 men's volleyball season:
- Charleston (WV) competes in the EIVA.
- Lindenwood, Lewis, McKendree, and Quincy compete in the MIVA.
- California Baptist and UC San Diego compete in the MPSF. The 2017 season is the last for UC San Diego in the MPSF, as it will leave to join the new men's volleyball league to be established by the Big West Conference in 2017-18.
- Conference Carolinas, the first all-sports conference in either Division I or II to sponsor men's volleyball, has 10 competing teams.
- The 2017 season is the last for Pfeiffer in Conference Carolinas and Division II; it is transitioning to Division III and will join the D-III USA South Athletic Conference starting in 2017-18. Should Pfeiffer continue to sponsor men's volleyball, it must do so as a D-III member because that division has its own national championship.
- Seven schools compete as men's volleyball independents. Three of these are campuses of the University of Puerto Rico. The other four are Alderson Broaddus, which began play in 2016; established D-II program Coker; Concordia-Irvine, transitioning from the NAIA to D-II; and Lincoln Memorial, which started play in the 2017 season. Concordia-Irvine will join the MPSF in 2017-18. Queens (NC) will add men's volleyball for the 2018 season.
Division II does not have a separate national championship, and neither Division I nor II has a sufficient number of teams to sponsor a national championship without the other.
Following the 2017 season, the MPSF men's volleyball league will lose half of its 12 members when the Big West Conference adds the sport. The five full Big West members that field men's volleyball teams will be joined by UC San Diego. At the same time, the MPSF will add Concordia-Irvine from the independent ranks and Grand Canyon from the MIVA.
Champions
+Vacated due to NCAA violations
Team titles
Past tournaments
Historically, California-based universities have dominated the men's volleyball national championship; Loyola Chicago, Penn State, Ohio State and BYU are the only non-California universities to have won the National Collegiate championship; Hawaii and Lewis also won the championship tournament, but had their victories vacated due to NCAA rules violations. Only seven non-California universities have participated in the National Collegiate championship match (Loyola, BYU, Penn State, Ohio State, IPFW, Hawaii, and Lewis), although other universities such as Princeton and Ball State have participated in the final four. Only three finals have involved two non-California schools: the 2003 final, when Lewis defeated BYU but had its win vacated; the 2015 final, in which Loyola defeated Lewis; and the 2016 final, when Ohio State defeated BYU.
UCLA, Southern California, Penn State, Stanford, and Long Beach State are the only schools in Division I to have won an NCAA national championship in both men and women's volleyball. (But for Hawaii's vacated 2002 title, it would have matched this feat with 3 NCAA and 1 AIAW women's national championships.) In addition, Stanford (1996-97) and Penn State (2007-08) are the only universities whose men and women's volleyball programs won the national championship in the same academic year. The 2016 championship tournament took place from May 3-7 at Rec Hall on the campus of Penn State.
2011
- May 5, 2011 - UC Santa Barbara def. Southern California, 29-27, 24-26, 25-15, 25-18; Ohio State def. Penn St., 25-18, 24-26, 25-22, 25-23
- May 7, 2011 - Ohio State def. UC Santa Barbara, 20-25, 25-20, 25-19, 22-25, 15-9
2012
- April 29, 2012 - Selections
- May 3, 2012 - Semifinals (6 p.m./8 p.m. PT) at Galen Center, Los Angeles, California: #1 seed UC Irvine defeated #4 seed Penn State 3-1 (18-25, 25-18, 25-15, 25-19); #2 seed Southern California defeated #3 seed Lewis 3-1 (25-18, 25-12, 18-25, 27-25)
- May 5, 2012 - Championship (7 p.m. PT) at Galen Center, Los Angeles, California: UC Irvine defeated Southern California 3-0 (25-22, 34-32, 26-24); 9,612 attended (record)
2013
- April 28, 2013 - Selections
- May 2, 2013 - Semifinals (6 p.m./8 p.m. PT) at Pauley Pavilion, Los Angeles, California, NCAA.com: No. 2-seed UC Irvine defeated No. 3-seed Loyola-Chicago 3-0; No. 1-seed BYU defeated No. 4-seed Penn State 3-0
- May 4, 2013 - National Championship (6 p.m. PT) at Pauley Pavilion, Los Angeles, California, ESPNU: UC Irvine defeated BYU 3-0 ( 25-23, 25-22, 26-24)
- May 4, 2013 - Game Notes: UC Irvine head coach David Kniffin became just the second coach in NCAA men's volleyball history to win a national title in his first season; 6,295 attended the title game
- May 4, 2013 - All-Tournament Team: Connor Hughes, who had 11 kills in the title game for UC Irvine (Most Outstanding Player); Chris Austin, UC Irvine; Michael Brinkley, UC Irvine Collin Mehring, UC Irvine; Kevin Tillie, UC Irvine; Ben Patch, BYU; Taylor Sander, BYU
2014
- The semifinals and finals 2014 tournament were held in the Gentile Arena in Chicago on the campus of Loyola University Chicago. Two quarterfinal "play-in" matches were held at the Gentile Arena two days prior to the national semifinals, as the 2014 tournament expanded to six teams for the first time ever. A second at-large was added to the field, and the champions of the newly-eligible Conference Carolinas men's volleyball division got an automatic qualification. The six teams were seeded according to the same methods used to seed the teams in previous tournaments, with the top two seeds receiving byes into the Final Four, and the third seed facing the sixth seed and the fourth seed facing the fifth seed in the quarterfinals.
- Apr. 29: Quarterfinals (#3 vs. #6 seed; #4 vs. #5 seed)
- May 1: Semifinals (#1 vs. #4-#5 winner; #2 vs. #3-#6 winner)
- May 3: NCAA Championship
2015
- The semifinals and finals of the 2015 tournament were held in the Maples Pavilion on the campus of Stanford University. Two quarterfinal "play-in" matches were held at the Maples Pavilion two days prior to the national semifinals. The six teams were seeded according to the same methods used to seed the four teams in previous tournaments; the top two seeds received byes into the Final Four, while the third seed faced the sixth seed and the fourth seed faced the fifth seed in the quarterfinals.
- May 5: Quarterfinals (#3 vs. #6 seed; #4 vs. #5 seed)
- May 7: Semifinals (#1 vs. #4-#5 winner; #2 vs. #3-#6 winner)
- May 9: NCAA Championship
2016
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