Spikers volley for wins, top spot in rankings

By JOSH DAECHE
Collegian Staff Writer

The NCAA men's volleyball season is underway, and even though the NCAA Tournament is four months away, the jostling for position has already begun.

Last week the men's volleyball season swung into action and for most of the volleyball community, it was no shock to see last year's National Champion UCLA squad ranked No. 1 out of the gates. The Bruins have four of their six starters back from last year's championship team. But the Bruins' goal of returning for school crown No. 18 will not be an easy one to fulfill.

Top 10 in action

The No. 1 Bruins won their opening match with relative ease in three games (15-2, 15-6, 15-11) against UC Santa Barbara. The Bruins currently are in Hawaii to defend their throne against top-ranked competition in No. 2 Lewis and No. 3 Hawaii. They also played the Nittany Lions last night as part of the Hawaiian Outrigger Classic.

Lewis started the season at No. 2 and defeated Rutgers-Newark last Saturday in four games. It also will play the other three teams visiting Hawaii this week.

No. 3 Hawaii defeated UC San Diego in three matches (15-0, 15-7, 15-10) last Saturday. The Rainbows saw heavy production from Dejan Miladinovc who hammered a match-high 17 kills.

BYU moved up the volleyball ladder three spots to No. 4 after knocking off Ohio State in back-to-back matches last weekend at Ohio State.

Pepperdine rounds out the top five with a 4-0 record. The Wave played three matches with No. 12 Penn State last weekend and washed the Lions (0-4) back to shore. The Wave took all but two games from the Lions. Pepperdine saw a strong performance from last year's NCAA Player of the Year George Roumain who had 39 kills in last Thursday's match.

Ohio State dropped out of the top five to No. 6 after losing to BYU, but did clinch its first victory of the season earlier last week by putting Penn State away in three straight games. All-American setter Angel Aja continued his dominance around the net with 101 assists in the five-game marathon loss to BYU.

No. 7 Long Beach State defeated No. 11 USC in five games (15-9, 13-15, 12-15, 15-5, 20-18) in the championship match of the UC Santa Barbara Collegiate Classic.

The 49ers do not play a ranked opponent until Feb. 5 when they meet up with No. 8 Stanford.

Loyola and IPFW round out the current top 10.