The 2018 men's volleyball season ended with a 3-0 loss in Columbus. Ohio State, the two-time defending NCAA Champions, looked like they might be a bit more vulnerable this season. OSU lost only four matches in the past two seasons combined, but entered the MIVA Tournament final with Loyola at 22-5, including losses this season at Loyola, at Lewis, and at Ball State.

OSU also lost to BYU and UCLA. That, together with Loyola's loss to UC Irvine, helped UCLA and UC Irvine capture the two at-large bids in the 2018 NCAA Tournament.

Despite having won the past four NCAA Championships, the MIVA had a down year. As the lone MIVA representative, the Buckeyes came in as the 6 seed in the tournament, behind 3 seed UCLA (MPSF), 4 seed UC Irvine (Big West), and 5 seed Harvard (EIVA). By splitting into two conferences (Big West and MPSF), the Old MPSF got four out of seven teams in the NCAA Tournament.

It was a very fine season for Loyola as they had rebounded from a couple of semi-rebuilding years. This squad gutted out some huge wins this year and put themselves in a solid position for an at-large bid and even winning the conference. As expected, however, Loyola did not receive an at-large as a few other schools had a better resume than Loyola did.

Loyola will lose Ricky Gevis, Jeff Jendryk, and Ryan Jamison from the starting lineup. Jake Selsky will also be graduating. Next year may be a step back because of this. Kyle Piekarski should step right in and contribute in the middle so no worries there at this point. Replacing two pin hitters will be interesting. The emergence of Ryan Jamison was probably the biggest key of this season that just ended. He was a defensive stalwort in the backrow while playing consistently enough at Outside. His serve got stronger and more consistent too as the season progressed. It was very pleasant to see him succeed after riding the pine for his first three years but unfortunately he is graduating. I'm hoping Will Tischler can become a key part of this lineup next year. After getting a lot of playing time his first two years, we didn't see him much this year. Hopefully he can have a good off-season going into 2019. There are a couple of freshmen who will get a chance next year. Thomas Kovanic at 6' 8" can possibly go on the right side. Devin Joslyn saw some time on the court earlier this year and Mark gave him him some praise after a match. I guess we'll just see in 8 months.

While the MIVA was a tad weaker Ohio State has proved to still be a formidable opponent. Having lost a few key contributors from the last two years, this Ohio State team is still very dangerous with The French Connection of Nicolas Szerszen and Maxime Hervoir. Szerszen is arguably one of the two best players in college right now and you can basically flip flop him with TJ Defalco. They have a 6' 10" freshman right side, Jake Hanes, who will occasionally hit a ball that at this very moment still hasn't hit the ground . But most of the time he will terminate over the block. He's like a Ricky Gevis type and will be really good over the next three years. I'll be out in LA for the Men's Tournament as it's become my yearly trip and will be rooting for Ohio State to get the three-peat. And I really believe they can do it.

Some chaos ensued with the NCAA tournament field announcement. Of the 7 teams, only the top two were seeded. Ohio State is in the top draw so presumably they are the 4th or 5th seed and my guess is the 5th. Unfortunately, they were chosen to host the play-in game against the presumed lowest seed of the tournament King College. The play-in game was determined by OSU and King being close for travel purposes using the tradition NCAA model for the National tournament. So OSU got screwed a bit here having to play an extra match when the traditional play-in game winner will be the 6th seed. Harvard, having won the EIVA, received what I believed to be the 6th seed and plays one fewer match and avoiding the play-in.

I don't know how much of a step back we'll have. I'm optimistic for at least a MIVA title. Ohio State will lose "The French Connection" and we've got some key pieces returning. Zolg should only get better going into his Sophomore season. If Mahan improves again, he can be a big force on the outside. I'm less worried about the Opposite right now. Dane Leclair filled that the 1st game of the year and showed some potential, so worst case it's him. As vuster4 said, it's the OH position that is key. 2-3 years ago we couldn't find a consistent OH and it really hurt the offense. This year we figured it out, and the team looked a lot better. If that gets figured out, it should be a really good year.

My feeling is that Lewis will be the favorite. I don't believe they lose anyone from the starters.