NCAA men’s and beach volleyball players were honored the past two days as their respective conference players of the week.
That included the AVCA naming its national POWs, with the honors going this week to Hawai’i opposite Rado Parapunov in men’s volleyball and Lily Justine and Sarah Sponcil of UCLA for being the top beach pair.
MEN’S POWS
MIVA: The winners were Julian Moses of Lewis and Pelegrin Vargas of Purdue Fort Wayne.
Moses, a senior outside, had 16 kills and hit .609 in his team’s victory over Loyola to win the offensive honor, while Vargas, a junior outside, had 12 digs and a block in a sweep of Lindenwood.
EIVA: Junior outside Michael Fisher of Saint Francis had a big week, hitting .508 in two matches while coming up with 37 kills, 10 digs, two aces and two blocks in two victories. He was named the league’s offensive POW.
George Mason sophomore setter Luis Velez won the defensive honor for not only dishing out 82 assists, but coming up with 20 digs, six blocks and three kills in two victories.
MPSF: The honors went to UCLA junior outside Austin Matautia and USC senior opposite Ryan Moss.
Matautia averaged 3.78 kills in two wins, including a career-high 22 kills and 11 digs against Pepperdine and is the offensive POW. Moss had 39 kills and 21 digs in two victories as he won the defensive award for the second time this season.
Conference Carolinas: The POW is Geraldo Rivera, not the TV personality, but a sophomore outside for Limestone who had 18 kills and 19 digs in a win over Emmanuel.
Big West: The honorees were Hawai’i’s Parapunov, Long Beach State’s Nick Amado, and UC Santa Barbara’s Ryan Wilcox.
Parapunov, a junior opposite, is the offensive POW after averaging 5.67 kills, 1.33 blocks and 1.17 digs per set in two wins.
Amado, a senior middle, averaged 2.17 blocks per set in two wins over CSUN.
And Wilcox is the freshman of the week for the third time this season after the outside had 10 kills and hit .500 against UC San Diego.
BEACH POWs:
Big West: Long Beach State’s Allie Loitz and Sydney Stevens have gone 4-0 to start the season and were named the league’s pair of the week.
Loitz, a senior, and Stevens, a freshman, competing at No. 3, had four 2-0 wins over Cal State LA, Pepperdine, Northridge, and Bakersfield.
PAC-12: USC’s Abril Bustamante and Tina Graudina, are the pair of the week after beginning their season with a 5-0 record with straight-set wins over Loyola Marymount, Stanford, Arizona, Oregon, and UCLA. Bustamante and Graudina currently hold the VolleyballMag.com/Sand Socks national pair of the year award.
Justine and Sponcil swept all four of their matches last week. The AVCA honor follows their Pac-12 POW honor for February 26.
ASUN: North Florida’s No. 4 pair of Callie Workman and Dana Roski went 3-0 during the North Florida Invitational to earn pair of the week honors. Workman and Roski defeated Saint Leo, UNC Wilmington and College of Charleston last weekend, dropping only one set.
CCSA: The league announces Wednesday. Last week’s Coastal Collegiate Sports Assocation winners were the LSU pair of Claire Coppola and Kristen Nuss. They went 4-0 as LSU’s No. 1 to open the season.
