INDIANAPOLIS – The MSU Denver volleyball team, ranked No. 1 in the national coaches' poll for Division II, has maintained its No. 1 ranking in the South Central Regional rankings released Wednesday by the NCAA.
This is the third and final set of regional rankings this season. On Nov. 22 the field of 64 for the NCAA Division II Tournament will be announced, and the final, unreleased version, of the regional rankings will be used in helping determine the at-large qualifiers.
The final regional rankings are used to determine at-large qualifiers for the South Central Regional Tournament, which is also the first three rounds of the NCAA Tournament. Conference tournament winners from the Rocky Mountain Athletic and Lone Star Conferences earn automatic berths, then the six highest-ranked teams in the regional rankings, other than the automatic qualifiers, are also invited to the postseason.
In nearly every circumstance, the team finishing No. 1 in the regional rankings hosts the regional tournament, which this year will be from Dec. 2 through 4. The eight regional tournament winners advance to the NCAA Division II Championships, which are in Tampa, Fla., from Dec. 9 through 11.
Behind MSU Denver in the region are Colorado School of Mines, Angelo State (Texas), Colorado Mesa, Regis, Texas-Tyler, Lubbock Christian (Texas), West Texas A&M, CSU-Pueblo and Texas A&M-Commerce. Like MSU Denver, Mines, Regis, Colorado Mesa and CSU-Pueblo are in the RMAC.
The regional rankings don't reflect any results after Sunday, which includes CSU-Pueblo's upset of Regis in the RMAC Tournament and Texas A&M-Commerce's upset loss to unranked Oklahoma Christian in the Lone Star Tournament.
MSU Denver plays host to CSU-Pueblo on Friday in the RMAC Tournament semifinals, with Colorado School of Mines and Colorado Mesa playing for the other spot in the final.
NCAA regional committees evaluate a number of statistical categories in determining regional rankings. Included in the list is ratings percentage index, which evaluates the quality of a team's opponents as well as the quality of the opponents' opponents.
MSU Denver has the best in-region RPI in the region (.641), and has a comfortable margin over Colorado School of Mines second-place figure of .600. The Roadrunners also have the best Division II strength of schedule (.568) of any team in the region.
Five teams in the country have better RPIs than MSU Denver, though three are from the South Region (Tampa, West Florida and Nova Southeastern). The others are Cal State San Bernardino of the West Region and Central Missouri of the Central Region. Eight regional champions are seeded prior to the start of the national quarterfinals.
The Roadrunners, one of three teams to play in each of the last 20 Division II tournaments, play host to CSU-Pueblo on Friday in a match scheduled to start at 7:30 p.m. The RMAC final, also at the Auraria Event Center, is Saturday at 6 p.m.
