It's nice having my brain explode twice this year from Loyola men's volleyball news... Jaeschke leaving. As GoRamblers mentioned, and in my opinion, money was probably a big factor, and his commute is only 20 minutes longer (assuming he and family live in the city). There's a lot of behind the scenes stuff that some of you are more aware of than I am and it looks like those are contributing factors too. From a volleyball perspective, Shane Davis' recognition just went up exponentially in the volleyball world in my opinion. A two time men's champion coach moves to the women's side. It's not unprecedented as current ND coach Jim McLaughlin won on the men's side at USC in 1990 and the women's side at Washington in 2005. Women's volleyball is easily more popular than the men's game at the college level (only 20+ Division 1 men's programs).
Shane is inheriting a situation similar to Chris Collins on the men's basketball side at NU. While former coach Keylor Chan did have some success getting NU to the National Tournament, I believe it was only 4 times in 16 years or so if I remember my numbers correctly, NU underachieved this year and it may have been the final straw. I didn't even realize the Chan and NU parted ways a few weeks ago until I heard about the Davis hiring today. NU went 14-16 this year (seeing a lot of those losses being an NU season ticket holder). Honestly, they just were short one more talented outside hitter and for most of the year, if not entirely, had the toughest schedule in the nation. This kept NU's RPI very high and until the last few weeks of the year and they were considered on the bubble to get into the tournament (before losing a bunch of their last matches). NU is in the best women's volleyball conference in the nation, the Big 10. Nebraska just won the National Title. Penn State has won the title 6 times since 2007. Wisconsin was one of their victims two years ago. Illinois reached the Final in 2011. The Big 10 consistently has numerous teams ranked in the top 25 coaches poll every year. Shane has a lot of work to try to get NU into a consistent battle to get into the tournament, not too dissimilar to Chris Collins replacing Bill Carmody who had been on the brink of making the tournament but never did. I think Shane can do it. It will be interesting to see who he gets on his staff.
I myself have been following the Shane Davis journey since I arrived on campus back in 2002. From his final match at Lewis in '03 before we realized they were ineligible, to a 26-3 run in 2005, reaching and hosting the MIVA Final in 2006, reaching the MIVA Final in 2010 and 2011, finally winning the MIVA in 2013, the National Titles in 2014 and 2015... and having conversed with him on several occasions, just most importantly seems like a good guy. While I say good luck to him, the journey is not over as I look to renew my NU women's volleyball season tickets next year. It's a decent fanbase, easily outdrawing LU men's vball. As I felt with Jaeschke leaving, this too seems to be the right move for Shane.
Now we look forward to Loyola 2016. The current staff of Mark Hulse, Kris Berzins, and Ben Wilson, now led by Hulse won't be fazed by losing Shane. They've been there on this magical run the last 3 years and they are as much a part of the preparation and success as Shane was. This year is going to be tough to begin with as they try to replace two great players in Cody Caldwell and Thomas Jaeschke. The show gets on the road this Sunday with the season opener at home vs. UC-Santa Barbara.
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