Complete 2012 NCAA Division II Volleyball Tournament Bracket
NCAA Division II Midwest Regional Tournament Webpage
November 18, 2012 - There was tension, then elation. And one of the youngest teams in the country will get to go dancing.
After an up-and-down 15-15 season, the Hillsdale College volleyball team learned it hasn't yet played its last game of this season. The Chargers will enter the 2012 NCAA Division II Midwest Regional Volleyball Tournament as the No. 6 seed, marking the eighth time in the past nine years Hillsdale has earned a national postseason slot.
The Chargers will face the tournament's No. 3 seed, Grand Valley State, at the University of Indianapolis at 12 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 29. The Chargers and Lakers will play in the first of four quarterfinal matches at the Ruth Lily Center that day.
The other first-round matches will be: #1 Indianapolis vs. #8 Rockhurst; #2 Northwood vs. #7 Ashland, and #4 Lewis vs. #5 Ferris State.
Tickets will be $10 for adults and $5 for students, seniors and children.
Last year's regional champions, the Chargers will have a chance to defend their title, something they were far from assured of as the regular season concluded. The team struggled to end the season, finishing precisely at the .500 mark and losing to GVSU in the first round of the conference tournament on Nov. 14. But several factors led to Hillsdale clinching a postseason berth for the fourth straight year.
Hillsdale had one of the highest strength of schedule ratings in the nation. Five of its opponents - Wheeling-Jesuit, Southwest Minnesota State, Regis, Northwood and Rockhurst - all won conference tournament championships over the weekend. A sixth opponent, BYU-Hawaii, ran through its conference with an undefeated record. The Chargers' 26 unique opponents finished the season with a combined winning percentage of .631, and half of their opponents won at least 20 matches during the season. Strength of schedule is one of the categories used by the ranking committee to determine who qualifies for the postseason.
The Chargers played the top five seeds in the regional tournament a total of eight times, a whopping 27 percent of its schedule. Nationwide, the Chargers played five teams who enter the NCAA Tournament as the No. 1 seed in their respective regions.
Head-to-head matchups are also an important factor in determining regional rankings.
Hillsdale really helped itself in this area over a one-week span in October with some clutch victories.
At the GLIAC/GLVC Crossover Tournament Oct. 12-13, the Chargers picked up huge regional wins over Rockhurst and Missouri S&T. To illustrate how thin the margin of error in this process is, Missouri S&T was eighth in the most recent regional rankings, released Nov. 14. But the Miners were knocked out of the postseason by virtue of Rockhurst's surprise win in the GLVC Tournament, giving it an automatic berth in the NCAA tournament.
The weekend after the crossover tournament, Hillsdale went to Ashland and defeated the Eagles 3-0 int he only meeting of the season between these teams. That win helped prevent the Chargers from tumbling too far down the rankings, since a head-to-head win over another team close in the regional rankings is a significant factor in the rankings.
The postseason berth also puts senior middle hitter Lauren Grover in some exclusive company. Grover joins 2008 Hillsdale College graduates Megan Howard, Jen Pilot and Devon Blain as the only players in program history to be part of four different NCAA Tournament-qualifying Hillsdale College teams. Howard, Pilot and Blain were freshmen when the Chargers made their postseason debut in 2004.
The only season since then Hillsdale has been absent from the NCAA field was 2008.
The Chargers have a career record of 6-6 in the NCAA Tournament. They were the No. 1 seed in the regional tournament in 2006, 2010 and 2011, and are the reigning Midwest Region champs. Last year, Hillsdale hit a new high point in the program's history with wins over Missouri S&T, Northern Kentucky and the University of Indianapolis to win the regional championship. Hillsdale went on to the NCAA Elite Eight, where it beat Wheeling-Jesuit before losing to national runner-up Cal State San Bernardino in five sets.
The Chargers lost seven players due to graduation off last year's regional champion roster, and have integrated as many as eight players into regular spots in the playing rotation throughout the 2012 season. Grover and junior Caitlin Kopmeyer (pictured) are the most experienced players back from last year's Final Four team. Kopmeyer is the first player to record 300 kills and 300 digs in the same season for Hillsdale under the current 25-point rally-score format.
Kopmeyer and Grover were each named First-Team All-GLIAC earlier this weekend, and freshman Emily Wolfert (250 kills) was an honorable mention all-conference selection. The 17 players on this year's Hillsdale College roster had a combined 18 years' worth of college experience entering this season.
The University of West Florida, located in Pensacola, Fla., is the host school for the 2012 NCAA Division II Volleyball Elite Eight Tournament.