Since joining the Great Midwest Athletic Conference in the fall of 2017, the Hillsdale College's women's volleyball program has been a dominant force.
The Chargers have won four straight G-MAC regular season and tournament titles, put up a 55-2 conference record and a have 55-match regular season winning streak in G-MAC play entering the fall of 2021.
While the G-MAC continues to improve as a volleyball conference and the competition gets tougher, coaches around the league still view Hillsdale as the team to beat, according to the Preseason Coaches poll presented by Under Armour announced this morning.
Hillsdale was the top overall vote-getter, with 62 points, and was the pick of every opposing coach to capture the North Division title in 2021, claiming 11 first-place votes.
The 2021 G-MAC regular season runner-up, Walsh, was picked to finish second in the North Division, with 49 points, and Cedarville was picked as the favorite to win the South Division, with 56 points. You can see the full poll below.
There are two major changes to the G-MAC schedule this season – the return to divisional play, and alterations to the conference tournament.
In an effort to create more in-conference matchups and to prepare the league for the arrival of two additional members over the next two years, the G-MAC has returned to a divisional format split on North/South lines. Hillsdale resides in the North, along with Walsh, Findlay, Ursuline, Malone and Lake Erie, while Cedarville, Tiffin, Ashland, Ohio Dominican, Trevecca Nazarene and Kentucky Wesleyan make up the South.
In addition, the end-of-season conference tournament is being reduced from eight to six teams in the G-MAC. The top three teams in each division will make the tournament, with each division champion earning a first-round bye and the team with the best overall record receiving the top seed and hosting rights for the semifinals and finals.
Hillsdale heads into the season with big goals, returning every player that saw action in the partial spring 2021 season and bringing in a strong freshman class, including four players who were slated to graduate in the spring of 2021 but who couldn't pass up the opportunity to make one more run at NCAA glory after a Covid-19 waiver was extended to preserve their eligibility.
That core group of unprecedented fifth-year players – Allyssa Van Wienen, Lindsey Mertz, Madie Schider and Maddie Clark – is just the tip of the iceberg on a loaded and talented roster that may be the deepest in Hillsdale College history.
Van Wienen, a consensus 2019 All-American and the 2019 G-MAC Player of the Year, is joined up front by junior Karoline Shelton, who was the G-MAC Player of the Year in the 2021 spring season, along with a host of past All-G-MAC honorees – senior Maggie DePorre, sophomore Megan Kolp, and freshman Maizie Brown (who played with the Chargers in the spring) – to give Hillsdale a formidable group of hitters.
The decorated Mertz, who's on track to set the Charger program's career assists record, conducts the offense from the setter position, and Hillsdale proved in the spring it has a capable backup in Madeline Zenas, who was named to the All-G-MAC third team after filling in for Mertz following an injury.
In the back row, Schider, top 10 in program history in digs, is joined by sophomore Audrey Riley and freshman Alli Wiese, a breakout star at libero who earned first-team All-G-MAC honors in the spring, to give the Chargers an elite back row.
Returning Chargers at all positions will be pushed by a strong and talented five-player freshman class which has the skill and the determination to contribute early on, the way Brown and Wiese did in the spring of 2021.
On top of a challenging conference slate, Hillsdale also boasts a challenging non-conference schedule as well. All four of the teams they are slated to play at the season-opening Ferris St. Invite have been ranked in the top 20 in Division II in the last two years, including Oklahoma Baptist, who finished the spring 2021 season undefeated and ranked second in Division II.
The Chargers also have a home date against Ferris St., always one of the top teams in the Midwest, later in the season, as well as the Midwest Region Crossover on Oct. 15-16 between the G-MAC, GLVC and GLIAC in Hammond, Indiana that always plays a major role in determining regional seeding in the NCAA Tournament at the end of the year. Tickets are on sale for all of Hillsdale's 10 home matches, and you can see the full schedule here.
Great Midwest Volleyball Preseason Coaches Poll presented by Under Armour
North Division
(1) Hillsdale – 62 points (11 first-place votes)
(2) Walsh – 49 points (1 first-place vote)
(3) Findlay – 45 points
(4) Ursuline – 28 points
(5) Malone – 26 points
(6) Lake Erie – 11 points
South Division
(1) Cedarville – 56 points (7 first-place votes)
(2) Tiffin – 46 points (4 first-place votes)
(3) Ashland – 45 points (1 first-place vote)
(4) Ohio Dominican – 34 points
(5) Trevecca Nazarene – 23 points
(6) Kentucky Wesleyan – 12 points