Stevens Men’s Volleyball tabbed second in the country by AVCA
Charles O'Brien
HOBOKEN, N.J. (January 3, 2018) – The Stevens Institute of Technology men's volleyball team is ranked No. 2 in the country according to the American Volleyball Coaches Association (AVCA) Preseason Top 15 Poll, released on Wednesday afternoon.
The Ducks received a pair of first-place votes and totaled 301 points in the poll. Defending national champion Springfield College received 20 first-place votes en route to the No. 1 ranking (325 total points). SUNY-New Paltz (288 points), Vassar College (241 points) and New York University (210 points) rounded out the top five.
"We are excited about the upcoming season as we have most of our team returning from last season, along with some great newcomers that are both very motivated and very talented," commented assistant coach
Amable Martinez. "It is an honor to start the season with such a strong ranking and we are motivated to grind even harder than we did last season to produce a better outcome than we had in 2017."
Stevens returns 15 letterwinners and five starters from a team that went 31-6 a season ago and reached the NCAA Tournament semifinals. The Ducks finished the season ranked third in the final AVCA poll.
The Ducks, who will open the 2018 campaign at the inaugural Texaco Rainbow Warrior Classic, hosted by the University of Hawaii, will play 11 matches against teams ranked in the AVCA top 15, highlighted by three games against teams ranked in the top-five. Stevens will also take on Milwaukee School of Engineering and Nazareth College, who were among teams receiving votes in the national poll.