Cleaner link for all of you like me, who will be watching Volleyball all day today. It's only 2 hours away!

https://www.avca.org/events/top25-matchups-tv.html

Love Sce-na-rio confirmed slaps

Oregon just won a set 41-39 over #2 Minnesota where they "lost" a point down 38-37 that would have ended the set and had to challenge to get it reversed. Last two points were also kills scored by a DS forced to play front row because Oregon ran out of subs. Crazy match.

And down goes #2 Minnesota in 4 Sets. #2 ranked team in the country misses out on the chance to play a home Final Four.

Should start a vba thread. Pure ass sport.

They lost to Oregon earlier in the season iirc. Gopher kryptonite.

This is incredible, I'm annoyed I missed it. Thanks for the heads-up and schedule. I watched a ton of the tournament last year and have been waiting for it to come around again.

All i have to Say is GO DUCKS!!

red velvet is ****ing sick.

I got blackpink as #1 though.

2018 was just a huge kpop year.

For those of you interested, tomorrow all 4 elite 8 matches are on ESPNU in a row starting at 4 PM ET. A quick viewing guide for each match.

4 PM ET #6 Wisconsin at #3 Illinois

These teams split their two matchups this year with the road team winning each match. Should be a close match, very possibly best match of the day.

Players to watch:

Wisconsin - Dana Rettke 6'8" MB, National Freshman of the Year last year

Illinois - Jordyn Poulter, Senior Setter and potential POY candidate

6 PM ET #7 Nebraska vs #15 Oregon at Minnesota

Nebraska is the defending champion and swept Oregon in an early season match. They're big favorites on paper but Oregon was supposed to be an easy match for Minnesota too.

Players to watch:

Nebraska - Mickaela Foecke 6'3" OH, National Championship Most Outstanding Player in 2015 and 2017

Oregon - Ronika Stone 6'2" MB, just a super athlete

8 PM ET #5 Texas at #4 BYU

Even though Texas is on the road and the lower seed, if there were Vegas odds Texas would be a strong favorite. BYU had a late season ending injury to their 2nd best player and have been on shaky ground since.

Players to watch:

BYU- Roni Jones-Perry 6'0" OH, another potential POY candidate

Texas - Micaya White 6'1" OH, Big 12 POY, scary moment in their match today when she appeared to go down with an injury but she returned to action and Texas went on to win

10 PM ET #8 Penn St at #1 Stanford

Stanford is the favorite to win the title like they did two years ago. This isn't the type of powerhouse Penn St team you saw for many years but you can never overlook them. Stanford and Penn St are tied for the most national titles all time

Players to watch:

Penn St - Jonni Parker, just a freshman but she has been a key player all year and in their biggest win of the season, an upset over Minnesota, she went off for 29 Kills.

Stanford - Kathryn Plummer 6'6 OH, Reigning National POY and a candidate to win it again this year. Plummer is the likely future face of USA Volleyball.



Final note: Only 10 teams have ever won a D1 Womens Volleyball National Championship. 4 of those teams are still alive in Stanford, Penn St, Nebraska, and Texas

Illinois, BYU, Wisconsin, and Oregon have all played in the National Championship and lost.

Women's VBall is a top tier college sport. Went to a B1G school and their games were great parties.

dont think it's allowed to be ugly and play volleyball

MEb, thanks for your summary. This first match is a staredown between expressionless head coaches. In the absence of other reasons I will root for the team with the cutest libero. In this case it's Illinois but have to go Wisconsin because MEB.

The libero killed volleyball

This Stanford vs Penn St match is right now.

Plummer was ridiculous to close that 2nd set.

Watched all 8 1/2 hours yesterday but was too lazy to post about it. Glad I did. No tiebreaker sets but at least three of the matchups seemed to me like they could have swung either way. Penn State losing that second set was just a killer. Too much Plummer. Makes me wonder how much the home court matters, since all three were won by the home team. Then again, some teams like Oregon and Wisconsin have demonstrated success on the road.

At a party on Friday night, ran into a friend who just got back from spending the fall in Happy Valley. He said he has Penn State season tickets and going to the games is incredible. Also ran into a friend who played college volleyball in the early aughts. Asked her about the rule changes since then (libero, rally scoring, substitution rules) and she said she's not really in favor of any of them, but that could just be a resistance to change.

Tucker,

If you know someone who isn't in favor of rally scoring, you've found a unicorn in the volleyball world. Sideout scoring was absurd in hindsight. I know someone who played in a 6 hour match in college during the sideout scoring era.

I'm in favor of the other rule changes as it means having higher skilled players on the court and a higher level of play, but I at least understand the counter arguments on these.

I'll be headed to Minneapolis this week and attending the final four matches and national championship game. Pretty much rooting for anyone but Nebraska at this point. Stanford is the best team on paper and have the best player. Illinois and BYU would both be first titles for their programs. BYU winning would also mean the first D1 National Championship won by a female head coach.

yah blackpink is solidly #2 in my power rankings (handshake)

I loved watching the vball women's tourney on ESPNU when I lived in the states. I did research on it and found out my UNI cut our women's vball program like 20 years ago, and have always been pissed about it.

Eh, to be fair our conversation wasn't too in-depth since we were short on time. Her preference for the old rules was sort of coerced from me than it was firm conviction. Even without having watched pre-rally scoring I can understand how this is an improvement.

Very cool that you're going. I'm rooting for BYU given they're relative newcomers and that they're clearly underdogs vs. Stanford. If they fall I suppose I root for whoever comes out of the other side. Not sure why you have angst against Nebraska.

Meb, set up the SE awards

Game of the year, athlete of the year, lol sports moment of the year, worst coaching decision of the year, banger of the year, artist of the year, movie of the year, best tv show of the year, best Phish jam of the year, etc.

The $100,000 solitary confinement bet between two poker players is over, the man who agreed to pay up, Rory Young, told The Action Network.

Young said he went in for a food delivery on Monday to Rich Alati, who was in a confined space for 20 days and, when Alati was still in good spirits, decided to negotiate a buy out.

The bet was scheduled to go for 30 days.

Young said he initially offered $25,000 for Alati to immediately exit the room, where he had been in darkness since entering on Nov. 21. Alati said no. Eventually, the two settled on Young paying $62,400.

“I saved a chunk of change,” Young said.

Young had been monitoring Alati by live video feed since the start of the bet. He told The Action Network on Friday that he couldn’t believe how lucid Alati was and thought he was going to lose the bet.

“At the last food drop, he was stronger than ever,” Young said Friday. “I underestimated his mindset, his resolve. I’m not disappointed I made the bet, I thought I had the better side, but he has exceeded all my expectations.”

definitely not what i was expecting

Insane balls to turn down 25k there

You just got to make the other guy believe you aren’t going to quit and you can get to 90k on the negotiations.

nomination for lol sports moment