The NCAA News - News and Features

March 17, 1997

On the dance card

It's not NCAA-sponsored, but a new event gives III men's volleyball a chance to crown its own national champ

BY GARY T. BROWN
Staff Writer

In men's collegiate volleyball, Division III is a lot like Cinderella: It does a lot of the work but come championship time, its ride turns into a pumpkin.

In a sport where sponsorship has teetered in the past, Division III schools have provided the numbers to support a National Collegiate championship but have never been issued an invitation.

But this April, Division III will have its own dance -- and even though the invitations aren't NCAA-embossed, the party nonetheless is a chance for Division III to don its own slipper.

The event is the Molten Division III Men's Invitational Volleyball Championship, in which a truly national Division III champion will be crowned for the first time. Born from the combined efforts of USA Volleyball, the American Volleyball Coaches Association (AVCA) and Molten U.S.A, Inc., the championship will bring four teams to Juniata College April 4-5 for a chance to wear the inaugural crown.

The championship is being heralded as a much-needed opportunity for Division III schools to vie for a legitimate title, and beyond that, for opening a window for continued growth of the sport in general.

'Something to play for'

"There really wasn't much of a shot for us to go the National Collegiate championship," said coach Dave DeNure of New Jersey Institute of Technology. "But now with the Division III Invitational, it makes it pretty realistic (to compete for a championship). Now there's certainly something to play for that's really attainable for us."

The NCAA National Collegiate Men's Volleyball Championship has been around for 27 years, and though all three membership divisions are eligible, no Division III team ever has received a invitation. Yet Division III schools provide nearly half of the 74 teams sponsoring the sport, boosting overall sponsorship to well above the 40 that have been required to maintain the NCAA brand on the championship.

"There hasn't been a legitimate opportunity to compete for a national championship for a significant number of institutions playing men's volleyball," Juniata athletics director Larry Bock said. "This (the Invitational) is an avenue that schools like ourselves can take to realize those goals."

The championship will begin with two semifinal matches April 4; the third-place and championship matches will be played the following day. Selection criteria include national won-lost record and strength of schedule based on the following factors: head-to-head results; record against common opponents; results against teams already selected and others under consideration; records against Divisions I, II and III opponents; and home and away records.

As the host institution, Juniata receives an automatic bid. The University of California, San Diego, was selected as the West/Midwest representative. Two other teams, an East/South representative and one at-large team, will be selected March 29.

Financial support from Molten -- a corporate supporter of men's volleyball that has signed on as the title sponsor for three years -- and Sports Imports will be used to pay for team travel to the championship site and help cover officials' fees. The AVCA also has chipped in with dollars and is providing administrative staff to help run the event.

May produce domino effect

According to DeNure and Bock, the championship's luster is not tarnished just because there's no official NCAA polish. They, among others, believe the event may produce a domino effect.

"Division III sees this as, one, a nice reward for the players involved, and two, something that in the long run will help further men's collegiate volleyball," Bock said. "At the grass roots and the scholastic levels, men's volleyball is exploding, but for a lot of different reasons there are only 74 teams playing NCAA men's volleyball, and one of the impediments to Division III growth in particular is that there's no real opportunity to compete for a championship.

"So I think that USA Volleyball and the AVCA recognized that this event may help some institutions make a more favorable decision with regard to bringing men's volleyball out of a club and into varsity status."

The involvement of USA Volleyball was critical in the initial stages of developing a Division III championship.

Doug Beal, a member of the USA Volleyball Collegiate Council, said the idea is a product of the USA Volleyball start-up grant program that, with financial support from the Sporting Goods Manufacturers Association, provides assistance for selected schools to initiate men's varsity volleyball programs. The program has awarded 23 grants since 1989, 15 to Division III schools.

"Since most of the growth over the last several years has been at the Division III level," Beal said, "and the fact that those schools have such a noncompetitive environment in which to qualify for the NCAA championship, we thought it was appropriate to try to develop some kind of a postseason or late-season championship event for them.

"There have been some other efforts along the way in various parts of the country to do some end-of-the-year Division III event but nothing on a national level. So we were very fortunate and pleased that Molten stepped forward to be the primary sponsor for the tournament."

Two-fold impact

Beal said the championship's impact will be two-fold: an immediate and obvious benefit for Division III and a long-term windfall for the sport.

"It means quite a lot for the growth of the sport because this is a very obvious vehicle for Division III schools to view as an incentive to begin varsity programs," he said. "And in today's climate -- with Title IX and gender-equity issues and just general economic problems -- anything we can do that will stimulate schools to consider volleyball seriously is very positive for the sport."

Bob Newcomb, former chair of the NCAA Men's Volleyball Committee and a member of the USA Volleyball grants program staff, thinks the tournament may trigger untapped growth in all three divisions.

"If as a result of this championship, more Division III schools find men's volleyball a sport that they can compete in, we feel that there could be a groundswell that may lead to some 50 sponsors at the Division III level," he said. "As we approach that point, we're going to begin to appeal to the NCAA that Division III is worthy of a championship of its own."

For that to happen, Divisions I and II would need to realize similar growth. Some believe, however, that growth in Division III is the more likely scenario.

"Given the climate in college athletics right now, Divisions I and II aren't likely to be adding many men's volleyball programs any time soon," DeNure said.

But Beal and Newcomb believe that growth in one sector may lead to growth in the others.

"If we do our job right, we put ourselves out of business," Newcomb said. "And the first place we go out of business is with Division III. If we're in fact successful in helping build Division III to a point where their numbers fall within the NCAA guidelines for a championship, the NCAA might take it (the championship) and then we could redirect our focus to Divisions I and II.

"Then if they could reach the point of 50 or so there would be enough critical mass there that further growth would occur on its own."

Preliminary discussions

"We've had some preliminary discussions with the NCAA," Beal said. "And they have indicated they would look favorably on initiating a separate Division III championship if we reach 50 sponsoring schools. We're at 34 right now, and we've already had some feelers from several conferences that would like to consider sponsoring it.

"We could potentially be at 50 in a couple years and that's really our hope -- you know we don't want to run this tournament (the Invitational) forever, but for three or four years, that would be fine."

Newcomb added that sponsorship growth also may come from a recent agreement between the NCAA and the United States Olympic Committee that will funnel $2 million annually over a four-year period to fund grants to all Olympic sports for the purpose of increasing participation opportunities.

"It's a great time for Division III in particular to be thinking about adding men's volleyball," he said.

If such growth is realized, maybe Division III won't have to rely on a fairy godmother any more for a ride to the ball.