Not surprisingly, the top three teams — BYU, Creighton and Cal Poly — stayed the same in this week’s VolleyballMag.com Mid-Major Poll presented by the NIVC.
But Marquette stayed No. 4 despite getting swept in a Big East match by Creighton and Northern Iowa is No. 5. The Panthers won a Missouri Valley Conference match Monday after voting was completed and are rounding into form.
Two other teams that are picking up steam are Colorado State, up three spots to No. 6, and Dayton, also up three notches to No. 7. Colorado State perennially is at the top of the Mountain West and Dayton is the team to beat in the Atlantic 10.
Loyola Marymount stayed at No. 8, while Denver moved up three spots to ninth. San Diego is also up three spots to No. 10. Portland, which was unbeaten heading into the week, lost twice in the West Coast Conference and dropped four spots to No. 11.
New to the poll this week is Pepperdine, in at No. 25.
Four teams from the VBM Poll are also in the AVCA Division I Coaches Poll: No. 1 BYU, No. 10 Creighton, No. 15 Cal Poly and No. 20 Marquette.
The 2018 National Invitational Volleyball Championship marks the second year of the revival of a Division I “NIT” event designed to bring another postseason opportunity into the sport’s calendar.
In 2017, Ole Miss defeated Texas Tech to win the NIVC title. The 2018 NIVC field will feature 32-40 teams. They will be selected after the NCAA Tournament makes announces its 64-team field. The NIVC will award berths to other deserving programs based on multiple factors, including RPI, overall record, strength of schedule and more. Much like the WNIT basketball event, matches are held at the participating schools.
The field will be announced late Sunday evening, November 25, 2018. The first round will start Thursday, November 29, with the championship match on Tuesday, December 11.
Selection — November 25
Round 1 & 2 — November 29-30, December 1-2
Round 3 — December 5-7
Semifinals — December 7-9
Championship — Tuesday, December 11, 7 p.m. Eastern
| Rank | School | Total Points Adjusted | First-Place Votes Adjusted | Win/Loss Record | Previous Rank |
| 1 | BYU | 625 | 25 | 12-0 | 1 |
| 2 | Creighton | 593 | 0 | 10-4 | 2 |
| 3 | Cal Poly | 576 | 0 | 13-1 | 3 |
| 4 | Marquette | 541 | 0 | 10-4 | 4 |
| 5 | Northern Iowa | 485 | 0 | 7-6 | 5 |
| 6 | Colorado State | 447 | 0 | 10-4 | 9 |
| 7 | Dayton | 432 | 0 | 11-4 | 10 |
| 8 | LMU | 407 | 0 | 11-2 | 8 |
| 9 | Denver | 393 | 0 | 13-1 | 12 |
| 10 | San Diego | 373 | 0 | 4-7 | 7 |
| 11 | Portland | 360 | 0 | 12-2 | 6 |
| 12 | Wichita State | 318 | 0 | 7-6 | 13 |
| 13 | Wyoming | 300 | 0 | 10-4 | 14 |
| 14 | Cincinnati | 295 | 0 | 10-4 | 11 |
| 15 | Western Kentucky | 268 | 0 | 11-5 | 18 |
| 16 | UCF | 245 | 0 | 10-3 | 16 |
| 17 | College of Charleston | 239 | 0 | 11-5 | 15 |
| 18 | Kennesaw State | 188 | 0 | 11-4 | 17 |
| 19 | Miami (OH) | 176 | 0 | 10-4 | 19 |
| 20 | ETSU | 133 | 0 | 12-3 | 23 |
| 21 | Lipscomb | 110 | 0 | 7-7 | 20 |
| 22 | Illinois State | 104 | 0 | 10-4 | 22 |
| 22 | S.F. Austin | 104 | 0 | 14-2 | 25 |
| 24 | Hawai’i | 87 | 0 | 6-5 | 24 |
| 25 | Pepperdine | 61 | 0 | 8-4 | NR |
Others receiving votes and listed on two or more ballots: Austin Peay, 52; Boise State, 45; St. Mary’s (Ca.), 41; Texas State, 22; James Madison, 10; UNLV, 4. There were 10 teams mentioned on only one ballot for a total of 95 combined points.
Dropped Out: Boise State 21
The pollsters: Kristin Belzung, Stony Brook; Keylor Chan, Samford; Dietre Collins-Parker, San Diego State; Courtney Draper, USF; Steve Florio, Fort Wayne; Ray Gooden, NIU; Greg Goral, Campbell; Kris Grunwald, Connecticut; Ashli Hain, UCI Irvine; Tom Hanna, Akron; Venessa Hackett Jacobs, Southern; Justin Ingram, UIC; Mike Jordan, New Mexico State; Shaun Kupferberg, Howard; Frank Lavrisha, San Francisco; Aaron Mansfield, LMU; Don Metil, Towson; Kent Miller, Saint Louis; Anna Moreno Allison, Bucknell; Kaddie Platt, Houston; Mark Pryor, North Dakota; Dave Rehr, Arkansas State; Jim Smoot, Southeastern Louisiana; Kari Thompson, Southern Illinois-Carbondale; Jennifer Weiss, Harvard.
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About Triple Crown Sports: Based in Fort Collins, Colorado, Triple Crown Sports has been producing events in youth athletics and the college ranks for more than 35 years. TCS runs both the preseason and postseason WNIT basketball events and produces the men’s and women’s Cancun Challenge tournaments in November, which have been recognized by Sports Illustrated as a top-5 destination tournament for D-I basketball programs.
Triple Crown produces the revived “WNIT” concept in D-I volleyball (the NIVC), which relaunched in 2017, and has operated a similar event in D-I softball (the National Invitational Softball Championships) in 2017 and 2018. TCS youth fast-pitch tournaments (including the 900-team Sparkler/Fireworks event) draw the nation’s finest club programs, and hundreds of college coaches attend this TCS event and others for recruiting purposes.
