After falling in the semifinals of the CCSA Beach Volleyball Championship, No. 5 LSU is preparing to make a run for a national title in the NC Beach Volleyball Championship.
Of the 93 beach volleyball programs in the nation, 17 were chosen to compete in the tournament; nine teams were automatic qualifiers after winning its respective conference championship and the remaining eight teams were at-large selections. For the first time in history, the tournament will follow a single-elimination bracket rather than the traditional double-elimination bracket.
The official first round of the tournament will kick off on Friday with eight teams going head-to-head for a spot in the quarterfinals. The quarterfinals, followed by semifinals, will take place on Saturday and the final round will be on Sunday.
Only two programs have been crowned national champions in the history of the NC Beach Volleyball Championship; USC and UCLA have definitely shown good reason as to why the title has only gone back to California, but this season showed a lot of fight in programs like TCU and Florida State.
Could this be the year a new victor arises? What’s to come of the championship tournament? Here’s a rundown on every first-round matchup and my predictions for how the tournament will play out:
9 a.m. CT | No. 1 UCLA versus No. 17 Texas A&M-Corpus Christi
On May 3, a singular opening round occurred to decide who would face UCLA in the official first round of the tournament. No. 17 TAMUCC secured its first tournament win in program history over No.16 University of Tennessee at Martin to advance as the team to face the Bruins.
The Islanders, 25-9, earned an automatic-qualification after winning the Southland Conference Championship for the second year in a row.
The No. 1 seed was given to the UCLA Bruins after successfully taking home the Pac-12 Beach Volleyball Championship. The Bruins come into the tournament with a 37-3 record and have earned the No. 1 spot in the AVCA Collegiate Beach Coaches Poll five times this season.
With its only losses coming from 2-3 battles against USC, Florida State and Stanford, the Bruins are picked as the favorite to go far in the tournament. UCLA and TAMUCC have only played against each other once all-time with the match ending 5-0 in favor of the Bruins, but the same outcome can be expected since UCLA has been a powerhouse beach program for years now.
10 a.m. CT | No. 8 UC Berkeley versus No. 9 Long Beach State University
With a 28-9 record, UC Berkeley was given an at-large bid and earned the No. 8 seed after taking home runner-up in the Pac-12 Beach Volleyball Championship. The Bears have 12 ranked wins on the season, including an upset over back-to-back national champion USC.
Long Beach State comes into the tournament with a 24-14 record and earned an automatic qualification after winning its first Big West Championship title in program history. The Beach is currently on a five-match win streak and has six ranked wins this season.
The outcome of this matchup is definitely a toss-up. The two have already met once this season, ending in a 3-2 victory for UC Berkeley—the Bears also lead the series all-time 4-0, but every match has ended closely at 3-2.
Given that anything can happen come tourney time, I’d expect more of a fight from the Beach this time around but wouldn’t be surprised if the match ended in favor of the Bears. Only one can be picked to advance, though, so I’ll have to go with the Bears on this one, but it definitely won’t be an easy win.
11 a.m. CT | No. 4 Florida State University versus No. 13 Florida International University
Florida State received the No. 4 seed after ending its season at 30-8, with the only losses coming from top-10 opponents. For the first time in program history, the Seminoles received an at-large bid instead of an automatic-qualification after they were knocked out of the CCSA tournament in the elimination bracket. Despite that, the Seminoles have shown strength in the sand all season.
FIU comes into the tournament with a 20-16 record. As the runner-up in the Conference USA championship, the Panthers earned an at-large bid and received the No. 13 seed.
When Florida State and FIU met earlier this season, Florida State came out on top with a 4-1 victory. The Seminoles have seen stronger programs since taking down the Panthers, so I’d imagine they’ve also gotten stronger themselves. With that, I expect Florida State to advance over FIU.
12 p.m. CT | No. 5 LSU versus No. 12 Florida Atlantic University
After falling to TCU 4-1 in the CCSA championship semifinals, LSU was given an at-large bid as the No. 5 seed in the tournament. The Tigers are 26-12 on the season and are coming off a hot run in the CCSA tournament.
With a senior-heavy starting lineup, LSU leans greatly on veteran players, and it’s paid off this season as the Tigers have seven wins against ranked opponents.
FAU, 19-13, earned an automatic-qualification after taking home the Conference USA title in its first year as a C-USA member. The Owls are also coming off a hot run in its conference tournament as they upset FIU in the final round, who was the favorite to win the title.
Although the Owls have a resume to back its place in the tournament, LSU brings more to the table. FAU faced a good amount of ranked opponents this season and even took home a few wins, but none came from top-10 teams, whereas LSU has four top-10 wins.
The two have also played against each other this season and the Tigers came out on top 3-0, so if I had to pick one, I’d say LSU will survive this matchup and advance to the quarterfinals.
1 p.m. CT | No. 2 Texas Christian University versus No. 15 Stetson University
The TCU Horned Frogs earned the No. 2 seed after winning its first CCSA Conference title in a dominant 3-0 sweep over Grand Canyon University. TCU comes into the tournament with a 35-2 record, only losing to top-10 opponents in UCLA and Grand Canyon.
Stetson received the No. 15 seed after winning the ASUN Conference Championship for the second year in a row. The Hatters are 22-14 on the season.
TCU and Stetson have met this season and it ended in a 5-0 win for the Horned Frogs. The same result can be expected in this matchup as TCU has continuously gotten better as the season has progressed.
2 p.m. CT | No. 7 Grand Canyon University versus No. 10 Stanford
As the CCSA Beach Volleyball Championship runner-up, Grand Canyon was given the No. 7 seed after receiving an at-large bid. The Lopes are 26-7 on the season with notable wins against TCU, LSU and UC Berkeley.
Stanford comes into the tournament with a 28-12 record and received an at-large bid with the No. 10 seed. The Cardinal have 12 ranked wins, including a 3-2 win over UCLA.
The two went head-to-head just a couple of weeks ago, and the match ended 4-1 in favor of Stanford. The all-time series is evenly split at 3-3, but considering Grand Canyon recently took down a strong TCU team, I’d pick the Lopes to go through to the next round.
3 p.m. CT | No. 3 USC versus No. 14 Georgia State University
USC did not compete in the final round of the Pac-12 Beach Volleyball Championship for the first time in tournament history this season, but with a 28-5 records, the Trojans were given an at-large bid and received the No. 3 seed.
In NC Beach Volleyball Championship history, USC has advanced to the final round five out of six times, taking home the title four times. As the back-to-back defending champions, the Trojans certainly know how to rise to the occasion come tourney time.
Georgia State comes into the tournament as the No. 14 seed, but in last year’s tournament the Panthers proved that seeding is just a number. Georgia State nabbed the title of “dark horse” after upsetting the No. 7 and No. 2 seeds with 3-2 wins. This year, Georgia State comes into the tournament with a 20-16 record and six ranked wins.
While I’d love to say this year will be another shocking tournament run for the Panthers, I can’t deny how strong of a team the USC Trojans are. Because of that, I have to go with the obvious choice and pick USC to advance.
4 p.m. CT | No. 6 Loyola Marymount University versus No. 11 University of Hawaii
Loyola Marymount received the No. 6 seed after winning the West Coast Conference title and comes into the tournament with a 28-8 record. Sixteen of the 28 wins by the Lions comes from ranked opponents.
No. 11 Hawaii comes into the tournament with a similar record of 27-8 and received an at-large bid. The Bows have notable wins over LSU, Washington and UC Berkeley.
The two met last year in the tournament and Loyola Marymount advanced in the tournament after defeating the Bows 3-0. Despite this tournament win, Hawaii leads the all-time series 12-3, and of the 15 matches, almost every one has been close in a 3-2 deciding match or a complete sweep.
I want to give Hawaii the nod to advance in the tournament because the Bows have dominated the Lions all-time, but when this season’s schedules of the two are compared, Loyola Marymount just has more impressive wins that lead me to think they’ll take home the win and move forward.
Quarterfinal Matchups
If the Round of 16 were to pan out in the way I’ve predicted, the quarterfinals would look like this:
No. 1 UCLA versus No. 8 UC Berkeley
No. 5 LSU versus No. 4 Florida State
No. 3 USC versus No. 6 Loyola Marymount
No. 7 Grand Canyon versus No. 2 TCU
I’ll go ahead and push UCLA and USC through to the semifinals simply because both programs have proven time and time again that the tournament is when they bring their all. UC Berkeley and Loyola Marymount are strong programs, but almost no match for what they’d see in their respective matches against UCLA and USC.
This is when it gets harder to pick who will advance and who will fall—a quarterfinal match between LSU and Florida State would make it the fifth meeting between the two this season.
Getting to play an opponent that many times is both a blessing and a curse for both programs: they know what to expect, which is great, but the problem is that the other team also knows what to expect.
In the last meeting between the two, LSU knocked Florida State down to the elimination bracket in the CCSA tournament, marking just the third time in program history that the Tigers pulled off a win. Could LSU do it again, or was it just a one time thing?
Another hard decision comes from a quarterfinal match between Grand Canyon and TCU. The two have met three times this season and TCU barely tops Grand Canyon with outcomes of 3-2, 0-3 and 3-0.
The second meeting between the two was a shocking upset win for the Lopes in the second round of the CCSA tournament, but TCU followed it up with a more important win in the final round. Does Grand Canyon have what it takes to pull off another tournament upset, or will the Horned Frogs keep it under control and sail past the Lopes?
Semifinal and Final Matchups
After long thought, here’s what I envision the semifinals looking like:
No. 1 UCLA versus No. 4 Florida State
No. 3 USC versus No. 2 TCU
To no surprise, the top four seeds are who I think will be the final four standing. It’s hard to not pick the four programs above when they’ve all brought strong resumes to back the seeding. As for the final two, I’m hoping to see a strong fight in the semifinals that skews the last matchup results.
With that being said, I’d put No. 4 Florida State up against No. 3 USC in the final match. Although the Trojans received the No. 3 seed, I think as the back-to-back defending champions, they have a lot of fire underneath them that will push them past the rest of the competition.
Florida State has the same fire as well, and considering they’ve taken down UCLA before this season, I think the Seminoles have what it takes to do it again to place them in the final match.
As for the final one standing, I hate to go with the favorite, but I think USC is a strong program that proves time and time again why the trophy has only ever gone back to California. The win definitely won’t come easy, but the Trojans are full of grit and determination whenever a national title is on the line.
The stage is set and all teams in this year’s championship are ready to compete in Gulf Shores, Alabama. The Round of 16 will be streamed on ESPNU and ESPN+ on Friday, then the quarterfinals and semifinals will be streamed on ESPN2 and ESPN+ on Saturday. The final match to crown the national champion will be streamed on ESPN and ESPN+.
LSU beach volleyball graduate student Kylie Deberg (20) sets up the spike on Friday, April 14, 2023, during LSU’s 5-0 victory against Nicholls in Baton Rouge, La.
