NCAA | Washington volleyball moves up in weekly RPI ranking

13-1 Huskies remain among the nation’s elite in AVCA coaches’ poll, W-L record and serving

The Washington Huskies—one of only seven D1 (out of 328) teams with fewer than two losses so far this season, moved up in the NCAA’s RPI formula and stayed put in the weekly AVCA coaches’ poll. The Huskies are #8 in RPI (up from #11) and stayed at #6 in AVCA.

Washington's Katy Beals (7) serves as Krista Vansant (16), Lianna Sybeldon (10) and Kylin Munoz (24) study the defense in Friday's 3-1 home win against Arizona
-photo by Shutter Geeks Photography

Of last week’s top teams, #9 Hawai’i suffered the biggest loss, dropping a rare home conference match to unranked UC Santa Barbara. The biggest winner was #5 Michigan State, defeating #8 Nebraska en route to the top of the Big Ten standings at 6-0.

Only two teams remain undefeated in Division 1, #18 Missouri and #12 Colorado State. #13 North Carolina saw its string broken by #24 Duke, joining Washington, Michigan State, Southern Cal and Florida in the one-loss ranks.

see also: What we learned from Washington volleyball’s win against Arizona State

The RPI is a formula used by the NCAA to help select 64 teams for the postseason tournament and to seed the top 16 teams. As usual, teams not ranked in the polls are seen more favorably by the RPI’s algorithms. As such, teams like Creighton, Kansas, Oklahoma and LSU are in the top 16, while North Carolina, Minnesota and Colorado State are among those who fare more poorly in RPI.

This week’s AVCA poll, with RPI and Volleyblog Seattle’s ballot in tomorrow’s Volleyball Magazine media poll:

WEEK EIGHT

AVCA Coaches		RPI	School (First Place votes)	Volleyblog Seattle
This Week	Last Week
1	1	4	Southern Cal	1
2	2	3	Florida	3
3	3	1	Texas	6
4	4	2	Penn St	5
5	7	9	Michigan St	2
6	6	8	Washington	4
7	8	5	Stanford	7
8	9	6	Nebraska	9
9	5	10	Hawai’i	8
10	11	17	Minnesota	10
11	12	13	San Diego	16
12	13	23	Colorado St	13
13	10	31	North Carolina	11
14	15	22	Kentucky	17
15	19	14	Wisconsin	12
16	17	28	Michigan	NR
17	14	24	Ohio St	19
18	25	12	Missouri	NR
19	21	37	Florida St	NR
20	24	20	BYU	14
21	22	43	Oregon	NR
22	16	39	Arizona St	18
23	NR	11	Kansas	NR
24	NR	18	Duke	NR
25	20	47	Purdue	NR
NR	NR	29	Miami (FL)	15
NR	NR	67	Central Arkansas	20
NR	18	42	Ohio	NR
NR	23	35	UCLA	NR
NR	NR	7	Creighton	NR
NR	NR	15	Oklahoma	NR
NR	NR	16	LSU	NR
NR	NR	19	Utah	NR
NR	NR	21	Marquette	NR
NR	NR	25	Illinois	NR

Others Receiving Votes and appearing on two or more AVCA ballots: Ohio 87; UCLA 77; St. Mary's (CA) 70; Miami (FL) 63; Creighton 60; Cal State Northridge 43; California 38; Oklahoma 32; Iowa State 18; Western Kentucky 7; Illinois 5

RPI COMPARISONS

	PAC-12			BIG TEN
4	Southern Cal		2	Penn State
5	Stanford		6	Nebraska
8	Washington		9	Michigan St
19	Utah		14	Wisconsin
30	Arizona		17	Minnesota
32	California		24	Ohio St
35	UCLA		25	Illinois
39	Arizona St		28	Michigan
41	Colorado		47	Purdue
43	Oregon		59	Northwestern
55	Washington St		90	Iowa
78	Oregon St		103	Indiana

NOTES:

• Washington once again leads all of Division 1 with 1.96 aces/set. The Huskies are #8 in the nation in hitting percentage with .378.
• The Pac-12 named Stanford's Carly Wopat its offensive player of the week, Utah's Chelsey Schofield its defensive player of week and--for the third consecutive week and the fourth time this season--USC's Ebony Nwanebu won the freshman of the week award.
• Seattle University has won 4 of its past 5 matches, all in the WAC. After Friday’s victory against Idaho, SU freshman outside hitter Iris Ivanis was named WAC player of the week. The Redhawks are now in third place, and host Grand Canyon tonight at 7PM in Connolly Center, then Chicago State Thursday night at 7PM, also in Connolly.

see also: What we learned from Washington volleyball’s win against Arizona State

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Photos courtesy Shutter Geeks Photography