Goodbye, Mountain Pacific Sports Federation; aloha, Big West.
Hawaii’s men’s volleyball program will join the Rainbow Wahine and its basketball brethren as a member of the Big West after the league announced Tuesday it was becoming the first traditional NCAA Division I conference to sponsor a championship in the sport.
Cal State Northridge, Long Beach State, UC Irvine, UC Santa Barbara move over along with UH from the 12-team MPSF after the 2017 season, and Cal San Diego gives the Big West a sixth member for men’s volleyball, the minimum required for automatic NCAA postseason qualification.
“The Big West is to be commended for their support of men’s volleyball,” UH coach Charlie Wade said in a statement. “From its inception, the Big West will provide our fans with an exciting and nationally competitive schedule. Five of the six schools have qualified for the NCAA Tournament during the past seven years and continue to be among the nation’s best men’s volleyball programs.”
Among the national powers Hawaii leaves behind in the MPSF are BYU, last season’s national runner-up, and UCLA and Stanford, which ranked third and sixth, respectively in the final rankings. The MPSF also crowns a champion earning automatic NCAA qualification.
Beginning with the 2017-18 school year, Big West teams will play a double round-robin format consisting of 10 games followed by a six-team tournament.
Last season, MPSF teams played conference 22 games, so, presumably, Hawaii (16-12, 11-11 Big West in 2016) will have to add a bevy of nonconference games/tournaments to beef up its schedule.
“For an established (D-I) conference to commit to men’s volleyball during these challenging times sends a positive message to the entire Olympic sports community that growth is possible,” Kathy DeBoer, executive director of American Volleyball Coaches Association, said in a statement.
According to its mission statement, “the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation was established during the 1992-1993 season to serve the competitive needs of member institutions from the Big West, Pacific-10 and Western Athletic Conferences as well as other selected universities in the western United States.”
Hawaii has never won an MPSF title, and since it inception conference teams have claimed 16 of 24 NCAA volleyball championships: UCLA (six), Irvine (four), BYU (three) Stanford (two), Pepperdine (one).