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Off the Block each week throughout the rest of the regular season and during the postseason will unveil its latest detailed projections to the NCAA Tournament.
The men’s volleyball Division I-II NCAA Tournament is comprised of seven teams. Automatic bids are awarded to the winners of the Big West, ConfCarolinas, EIVA, MIVA and MPSF conference tournaments, and the NCAA men’s volleyball committee selects two teams for at-large bids.
The five-person selection committee meets following all of the conference tournaments to decide the at-large teams and the tournament seeding. The field for the NCAA Tournament is scheduled to be released Sunday.
The NCAA Tournament will begin with a play-in match and then two first-round matches. The top-two seeds will receive byes to the semifinals and will play the winners from the first round.
Off the Block is in its 10th season of providing college men’s volleyball bracketology.
PROJECTED NCAA TOURNAMENT FIELD
FIRST-FOUR TEAMS OUT
Pepperdine (12-5)
Loyola (15-5)
George Mason (15-6)
Long Beach State (7-4)
Quick breakdown: There is no change in the latest NCAA Tournament projections following the conference tournament matches on Thursday. If the No. 1 seeds win the remaining four conference tournaments, the most important postseason match that can swing the bracketology will be UCLA versus Pepperdine in the MPSF Tournament semifinals. Pepperdine must win this match in order to have any realistic chance of securing an at-large bid. If UCLA loses, it still could earn the at-large bid over Pepperdine but the race gets incredibly murky with no clear favorite. Pepperdine with a win would hold the head-to-head advantage, but UCLA would have a better record against teams under NCAA Tournament consideration. Pepperdine getting the at-large bid would also benefit UC Santa Barbara. The Gauchos would likely move ahead of the Waves in the seeding and not have to compete in the play-in match.