California State University at Northridge
Westcliff University
No. 14 Matadors Host Westcliff Before Traveling to UC San Diego
2/21/2023 2:47:00 PM | Men's Volleyball
MATADORS THIS WEEK
MATCH #15:
Westcliff Warriors (2-7) at No. 14 CSUN Matadors (9-5)
Wednesday, Feb. 22, 2023Â - 7:00Â p.m. PT
Premier America Credit Union Arena - Northridge, Calif.
ESPN+
Live Stats
MATCH #16 (BIG WEST #1):
No. 14 CSUN Matadors (9-5) at UC San Diego Tritons (6-6)
Friday, Feb. 24, 2023Â - 7:00Â p.m. PT
LionTree Arena - La Jolla, Calif.
ESPN+
Live Stats
In-game Twitter updates:Â @CSUNMensVB
FORÂ STARTERS
The 14th-ranked CSUN men's volleyball team (9-5, 0-0 Big West), winners of a season-high five straight, caps a brief two-match homestand Wednesday before opening up the 2023 Big West season on Friday. The Matadors host Westcliff University in a non-conference match Wednesday at 7 p.m. before kicking off the Big West season Friday at 7 p.m. at UC San Diego.
FOLLOW YOUR MATADORS ONLINE
All Matador home matches this season will be streamed live on the ESPN+ platform with Darren Preston handling a majority of the play-by-play this season. Fans can also follow CSUN Matador men's volleyball on-line at the official home of CSUN athletics, www. GoMatadors.com for related links to the match, including for any live stats, audio and video.
Fans are also encouraged to check the CSUN Athletics Department's official Twitter feed (@GoMatadors) and the volleyball-specific feed (@CSUNMensVB) for news and notes throughout the week as well as updates of matches in progress.
CSUN REMAINS 14TH IN NVA/AVCAÂ TOP-15 NATIONAL COACHES POLL
Winners of a season-high five straight matches, CSUN (9-5) remained 14th in the latest NVA/AVCA Men's Division I-II Coaches poll (Feb. 20). The Matadors, who moved back into the poll for the for the first time since the 2020 season on Feb. 6 (No. 15), earned a season-high 43 points this week, up eight points from last week. Prior to Feb. 6 poll, CSUN had been ranked in the AVCA Top-15 for 62 consecutive weeks and 262 of the last 289 weekly polls dating back to the 2002 season.
Hawai'i (11-0) is the top ranked team for the eighth consecutive poll, collecting all 22 first-place votes and 330 total points. UCLA (13-1) remained second this week followed in the top five by Penn State (11-1), Long Beach State (8-2) and Grand Canyon (13-0). UC Irvine (9-3) remained sixth this week, followed in the top-10 by Pepperdine (9-5), BYU (8-4), Stanford (8-5) and Loyola-Chicago (11-2). The remainder of this week's top-15 includes Ohio State (10-4), Ball State (7-5), USC (6-6), the Matadors (9-5) and Charleston (13-0).
SCOUTING THE OPPOSITION
Westcliff (2-7), an NAIA school from Costa Mesa, has dropped six of its last seven matches, the lone win coming over Park-Gilbert last Thursday. The Warriors, who have played one other Division I school this season falling in straight sets to UC San Diego on Feb. 14, are led by Gabriel Pizza who averages 3.14 kills per set. Westcliff is hitting .124 as a team through nine matches. Wednesday's match will the first-ever meeting between CSUN and Westcliff in men's volleyball.
UC San Diego (6-6, 0-0 Big West) opens the week with a Wednesday road match at Concordia-Irvine before hosting the Matadors on Friday in the Big West opener for both teams. The Tritons are coming off a 3-0 sweep over Westcliff on Feb. 14 as Josh Schellinger finished with 11 kills (.333), three digs, two service aces, and a block to earn Big West Freshman of the Week honors. UCSD is a perfect 4-0 at home this season with wins over Emmanuel (3-0), Menlo (3-0), Ottawa (3-0) and Westcliff (3-0). Friday's match is the 92nd meeting all-time between the Matadors and Tritons. CSUN owns a 79-12 record in the previous 91 matches but UCSD has won four of the last five between the two teams including a straight-set win in Northridge last April. The Matadors are 40-6 all-time in La Jolla.
CSUN IN BIG WEST OPENERS
Heading into Friday's Big West opener at UC San Diego, CSUN is 19-26 (.422) all-time in conference season openers but is an impressive 26-18 (.591) all-time in conference home openers. The Matadors dropped their 2022 Big West opener at UC Santa Barbara (3-0) and has now dropped four straight conference road openers since the Big West added men's volleyball in 2018. The Matadors lost their conference road opener to Long Beach State to open the 2018 and 2019 seasons before the 2020 Big West season was not contested due to COVID-19. CSUN then fell in four sets at UC Irvine in 2021 before losing in straight sets at UCSB last season.
MATADORS IN THE RECORD BOOKS
A trio of Matadors are looking to etch their names in the CSUN Rally Scoring era record books. Redshirt junior Kyle Hobus currently ranks fifth in kills per set with a career average of 3.35. Hobus heads into the week with 606 career kills in 181 sets while taking 1,383 attacks over his three-plus seasons. Sophomore Donovan Constable has already entered the Rally Scoring era record books with 1,060 career assists which is good for eighth. Constable opens the week just 291 assists from catching Jeff Conover (2004-05) for seventh on the Rally Scoring era assists list. Junior Griffin Walters added four aces against Benedictine last week and now has 69 career service aces. Walters is now 13 aces away from moving into the top-10 as Mike Gaudino currently holds the #10 spot with 82 career aces.
CSUN QUICK SETS
Hobus passed a pair of milestone figures last week, eclipsing 600 career kills and 700 career points. Hobus, who leads the Matadors with 180 kills and a 3.67 kills per set average, has been CSUN's kill leader in each of the last six matches and 11 of the Matadors' 14 matches this season. After posting seven kills in the season opener against No. 2 UCLA, Hobus has reached double figures in kills in 12 of CSUN's last 13 matches. The lone exception in the stretch was the Matadors' 3-0 win at FDU on Feb. 11 when Hobus had eight kills on nine swings in just two sets of action ... With nine wins in 14 matches, CSUN is off to its best start since 2017 when the Matadors were also 9-5 through 14 matches. The Matadors were 8-6 after 14 matches in both 2018 and 2019 before seeing the 2020 and 2021 seasons cut short. Last season, CSUN was 5-9 through 14 matches after falling in straight sets at No. 1 Hawai'i on Mar. 25 ... With nine non-conference wins - and three matches remaining - CSUN already has its most non-conference victories since finishing 10-7 in 2019 ... CSUN's current five-match winning streak is its longest since 2018 when the Matadors also won five straight on two occasions.
MATADORS IN THE BIG WEST Â
2023 marks CSUN's sixth season as a member of the Big West in men's volleyball. Since the conference's inaugural season in 2018, the Matadors are 12-38 (.240) in 50 Big West matches over their first five seasons. CSUN finished 5-5 in the inaugural Big West season in 2018 before finishing 3-7 in 2019, 2-8 in 2021 and 1-9 in 2022. The 2020 conference season was not contested due to COVID-19. The Matadors reached the semifinals of the Big West Tournament in 2018 in Long Beach before falling in the 2019, 2021 and 2022 quarterfinals in Hawai'i. Prior to 2018, CSUN played 25 seasons as a member of the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation (MPSF) from 1993-2017 and 16 seasons in the Western Intercollegiate Volleyball Association (WIVA) from 1977-92.
THEO EDWARDS NAMED CSUN'S MEN'S VOLLEYBALL COACH
Theo Edwards, CSUN's associate head coach since 2019, was named the successor to Jeff Campbell on Dec. 9, 2022. Edwards completed his 12th season on Campbell's coaching staff in 2022. He was promoted to associate head coach in August 2019 and served as the program's recruiting coordinator. He has been instrumental in CSUN's top recruiting classes over the last several years as the Matadors have brought in a host of AVCA Top 50 high school players. As a four-year letterwinner for the Matadors, Edwards had his finest season as a senior in 2010 as the Matadors reached the NCAA Tournament semifinals. He was the team captain of the squad that became just the second CSUN team, and first since 1993, to reach the NCAA Tournament.
LOOKING AHEAD
After Wednesday's home match Westcliff and Friday's Big West opener at UC San Diego, CSUN will then play another non-conference match at Stanford (Mar. 3) before hosting the Tritons on Mar. 16 to cap the two-match conference set. The Matadors will then host Daemen in their final non-conference match of the season on Mar. 18 before hosting top-ranked Hawai'i for a pair of matches (Mar. 24-25).Â
#GoMatadors
