The NCAA Men’s Volleyball Committee is recommending a video exchange between the participating teams at the finals site.

The committee’s decision developed during its recent annual meeting calls for teams to share their two most recent matches. The recommendation comes with support from the men’s volleyball coaching community.

Proponents of the policy reason that because the championship field is composed of only four teams, it is likely that the participants have not met during the regular season.

“The coaches want to prepare more for the national championship,” said Brian Summers, the committee chair and assistant athletics director at Lewis. “They thought a video exchange would help facilitate making the matches more competitive if they were able to get more recent tapes on teams.”

The policy also would fill a current void, Summers said.

“You had to hunt and talk to your peers and get what you could,” Summers said. “All the coaches agreed with the thought process behind this. We went back to our respective regions, and it was pretty much a consensus that they were in favor of this as well.”

Teams previously scouted the nonconference portion of teams’ schedules in January or February, but because the men’s volleyball championship is in May, the committee is recommending that the video exchange be of the two most recent matches.

“A team could have an injury or lineup change that makes it significantly different than what it was back in January,” Summers said.

The Division I Championships/Sports Management Cabinet must approve the recommendation before it can become policy.

The Men’s Volleyball Committee is also recommending that results against nonconference competition be added to the championship-selection criteria.

“We were looking for another quantitative way to be able to evaluate teams,” Summers said. “With this being a National Collegiate championship, we wanted to make sure that teams that are going out and playing other schools are rewarded for that effort as opposed to it not being considered during selection time or seeding.”

The committee hopes this will create an incentive for teams to test themselves against tough competition.

“We want to give teams a reason to play nonconference matches and not stay in their silos,” Summers said.