GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. – The third year Golden Eagle men's volleyball program has earned their first ever trip to the playoffs, as they will be the six seed and travel to the three seed Mount Vernon Nazarene for WHAC Tournament Quarterfinal action on Wednesday, March 29. CU will play MVNU for the third time in the last four games as they will begin at 7 p.m. on Wednesday inside Ariel Arena. For more information on how to watch this week's action, visit the links below.
Opponent: #RV Mount Vernon Nazarene
Date: Wednesday, March 27
Location: Mount Vernon, Ohio (Ariel Arena)
Time: 7 p.m. EST
Live Video
Live Stats
WHAC Tournament Outlook
With the expanded WHAC in 2023 of 10 teams, the conference tournament now has six teams qualify and CU was able to earn the sixth and final spot with an 18-12, 8-10 WHAC record this season. They will take on the three seed Mount Vernon Nazarene, while the five seed Lawrence Tech travels to the four seed Aquinas for the other quarterfinal. The top two seeds of Indiana Tech (WHAC Regular Season Champions) and Lourdes get a bye. The winner of the MVNU and CU game will play Lourdes in the semifinals. The semifinals and finals will all be played at Indiana Tech in Fort Wayne, as they earned the bid for being the WHAC Regular Season Champions.
Dominance from Kyi Jagorin
Cornerstone played three five set matches and a four-set match last week and saw
Kyi Jagorin as a major standout in the week's competition, recording 20+ digs in every match this week. Before this week, Jagorin had only achieved 20+ digs in two matches on the season but he did it four consecutive times with a career high 25 digs in the first match against Mount Vernon Nazarene.
The Road to Nationals
The Golden Eagles need to get to the finals and hope that Indiana Tech also makes the finals to earn the automatic bid to NAIA Nationals out of the WHAC. Although to many it may seem like a long shot as the lowest seed in the conference tournament, CU's path to get there requires playing MVNU and Lourdes who they have gone to five sets with when they played in the regular season. CU went to five both times against MVNU this past weekend and then went to five one of two times against Lourdes earlier in the year, but they lost all four contests.
Scouting Mount Vernon Nazarene
The Cougars have pulled off a 19-7, 13-5 WHAC record in their third season as a program for one of their best seasons in program history. Mount Vernon is a veteran roster with eight upperclassmen on the team and are led offensively by junior Spencer Stanley who has 363 kills. As a team, the MVNU offense is what has powered them to success as they are second in the NAIA in kills with 1259. With every positive offensively comes the negative as well though, as the Cougars are first in the NAIA in errors with 598. Mount Vernon is solid defensively as well, with libero Daniel Skryzpchak ranked third in the NAIA with 314 digs and 3.08 digs per set.
Contact: Jesse Campbell |
nathan-jesse.campbell@cornerstone.edu | 616-222-1505
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