Five SAC Volleyball Team Earn NCAA Championship Selections
Five teams from the South Atlantic Conference have earned bids to the 2012 NCAA Division II Volleyball Championship, accounting for more than half of the Southeast Region field, the association announced Sunday night.
INDIANAPOLIS – Five teams from the South Atlantic Conference have earned bids to the 2012 NCAA Division II Volleyball Championship, accounting for more than half of the Southeast Region field, the association announced Sunday night.
Wingate is the highest-seeded SAC team at No. 2 in the region, followed by No. 4 Tusculum, No. 5 Lincoln Memorial, No. 6 Newberry and No. 7 Lenoir-Rhyne. All off the region's matches will be played at top-seeded Armstrong.
Wingate, which won the 2012 Food Lion SAC Volleyball Championship title over Tusculum earlier on Sunday, will face Lenoir-Rhyne in the bracket's first round. The Bulldogs will be making their eighth all-time NCAA Championship appearance, most of any team in the conference.
WU, which also won the SAC regular-season title, enters the Championship on a 20-match winning streak and is 29-2 overall.
L-R, meanwhile, will be making its first postseason appearance since 2004 and just its second in program history. The Bears finished the season 19-11 overall.
Wingate and Lenoir-Rhyne split head-to-head during the regular season.
Conference foes Tusculum and LMU will also meet in the first round. It will be the Railsplitters' fifth all-time appearance in the NCAA Championship, while TC will be making its fourth.
The Pioneers enter the Championship 22-7 overall while LMU is 21-13. The two teams split their matchups during the regular season.
Finally, Newberry will take on No. 3 seed Flagler in the first round. The Wolves are back in the NCAA Championship after earning their first-ever bid in 2011.
Newberry enters the event 18-14 overall.
NCAA Championship regional competition will get underway Nov. 29.